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And in case you're not excited about this. Here's some excerpts from a Popmatters piece on him.
Jennings satisfied the same need that the mythic, outlaw character has always fulfilled in society: he lives passionately, recklessly, and outside of the law, and we, with our more staid 9-to-5 lives augmented by spouses, kids, and suburbia, get to live vicariously through him. Men admire this hell raising rebel, even though they know what he's gonna do to their daughters and sisters when he gets to town; women like his dark, shy looks, even though they know he'll never stick around. Even those who fear and despise him -- Pentecostal preachers, conservative Republicans, and William Bennett -- use him as a symbol of decadence, of why society has forsaken Christian values for sex, drugs, and fast cars. Jennings, with his bloodshot eyes, uncombed hair, and scraggly beard, was living proof that rowdy living led to dissipation and, finally, hell.
Jennings' battle to do things his own way in Nashville in the early '70s cemented his rebel status. He'd felt stifled in RCA's studios with producers choosing his songs, looking over his shoulder, and adding cheesy background singers to choruses. He'd even considered quitting. Finally, though, he did what any person who'd grown up in the honky-tonks of Texas would've done: he fought. Jennings' fight was a simple one. He didn't take on Chet Atkins and RCA because he was an "artist" worried about poetic lyrics, concept albums, or posterity. He didn't give a fuck about art: he just wanted to play country music his own way. Hell, RCA gave Jefferson Airplane more artistic freedom than he had, plus lots of studio time to make unlistenable albums with space themes. In the fallout that ensued, Jennings formed WGJ -- Waylon Goddamn Jennings -- Productions, made the finest music of his carWith lots of volume and a few cold domestic beers, a Jennings song is like that. If you're cutting loose, taking a weekend break from work, why would you want to listen to some milquetoast hat act who grew up listening to Billy Joel and Dan Fogelberg? You wanna hear the bass drum thumping in your chest and the bass guitar rattling the light fixtures. You wanna hear Waylon's deep moan rolling out of the speakers, telling some tale about a no good woman he met in some godforsaken honky-tonk. Sure, tomorrow your head will hurt like a motherfucker and the reality of work and bills will kick you in the ass. But as long as the music's playing you can be an outlaw too and life can burn a little brighter. Call it redneck fundamentalism, and thank Waylon Jennings for saving your country souleer, and earned a shit load of money for RCA
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I tried to find somebody of that sort that I could like that nobody else did - because everybody would adopt his group, and his group would be _it_; someone weird like Captain Beefheart. It's no different now - people trying to outdo ! each other in extremes. There are people who like X, and there are people who say X are wimps; they like Black Flag.
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