20th Century Lee

AMG Review of 20th Century Lee

Quint Kik
All Music Guide

Being responsible for an endless line of albums and international hits for both Duane Eddy in the '50s and Nancy Sinatra thereafter, surprisingly Hazlewood still had time left to maintain a solo career. Since America had enough of him, the artist migrated to Sweden to fulfill his potential as an actor and screenplay writer. From the moment he made his first movie for television in 1970 (Cowboy in Sweden), Hazlewood seemed to experience more artistic freedom than ever before. Not only did he make several more of them, but he also equalled his album output. To the ten between 1963 and 1969, Hazlewood added 11 more albums until 1977. Some of them were truly exceptional (Poet, Fool or Bum from 1973), while others remain highly obscure. Although it appeared Hazlewood's creative well didn't run dry immediately, the outcome of his late-'70s, Swedish/German-only releases largely proved an inconsistent affair. For some reason, Hazlewood didn't feel like keeping up anymore with the high standard of '60s albums like Lee Hazlewood-ism: Its Cause and Cure or Love and Other Crimes. Over-production and the artist's growing tendency to record his favorites instead of writing new material make 1976's 20th Century Lee a little disappointing at first. However, the specific Hazlewood touch is not lost on all selections here. "That's How I Got to Memphis" and "The Ballad of Lucy Jordan" are well-chosen tearjerkers with a nice, soothing background choir. Elsewhere, "My Girl Bill" offers the kind of tongue-in-cheek phrasing similar to Hazlewood's own lyrics. The only original here is the reappearing "The Fool," one of Hazlewood's biggest commercial successes of the '50s for Sanford Clark. Including this particular song seems either a self-reflecting gesture or a sorry excuse for partly trying to sing in Spanish ("An Old Lullaby") and even in Swedish: a version of Evert Taube's "Brevet Frĺn Lillan proves as much hilarious as uncanny a closing piece on the album. If by chance you think you've heard it all, nothing can prepare you for the ambiguous highlights of 20th Century Lee, as Hazlewood takes both "Indian Summer" and "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On" to a high and unforeseen level. While the former wouldn't be out of place in a '70s soft-porn pic, the latter -- with its interrupting pan flute solos -- is on the verge of a porno itself. "Come on over baby/We've got chicken in the barn" sounds outright scary if sung with a voice as deep as Hazlewood's. Both the Swedes and the Germans seemed to have had high commercial expectations of it, because a 12" with special disco mixes was issued separately.