10 Non Rock Albums That Rock Music Fans Love

If you wanted to be really pedantic here, country may have been the true origin of rock and roll before Chuck Berry came along. Before we had Johnny B Goode, there were loads of bands that seemed to blend rockabilly elements into their music, from Brian Seltzer bringing the slick sounds of the '50s back into rock and roll and even George Harrison taking the country infused songs of Carl Perkins into the Beatles' early hits. Country music is also full of misfits though, and Steve Earle may have been one of the first times where country started to go alternative.

While the songs of Guitar Town definitely still fit into the country aesthetic most of the time, the lyrics behind them sound like they came directly out of the rockers' songbook, having just as much to do with the freewheeling lifestyle of the traveling musician as they do with drinking your troubles away. For all of the great odes to simple living, Earle has his eye on something a lot closer to the bone, with songs that are meant to be more in line with the reality of touring life, from seeing faces of people you will never really get to know to apologizing for not being there for your family on Little Rock n Roller.

There might be a country heart at the center of all of this, but it seems to be much more in line with the kind of country that the Rolling Stones wrote about on songs like Angie or Wild Horses, looking to find some sort of relief from the sadness that comes and goes in your life. The life of a music star might seem like the greatest thing in the world, but it can also be incredibly lonely the more you look into it.