Of course, other artists had mentioned themselves on their own records before, particularly Loretta Lynn in “Hey Loretta,” and David Allen Coe in “You Never Even Called Me By My Name.” Jennings had no problem with the song’s references and quickly snapped up “Luckenbach, Texas” to launch his new album “Ol Waylon,” the first country album to “ship gold,” (meaning advance sales of 500,000 units before the album was released), and the first to debut in the #1 position on Billboard’s country album chart, where it remained for thirteen weeks.
The “Ol Waylon” album (its title taken from the previous fall’s CMA telecast in which Willie Nelson amusingly refers to Jennings several times as “Ol Waylon”) reached platinum status on October 7th, 1977.
While Waylon was in Moman’s American Studios in Nashville recording “Luckenbach, Texas,” Nelson happened to drop by for no particular reason. Jennings saw him and said, “Hey come on over here and sing with me on this.” So Willie ended up adding his voice to the final verse, providing a couple of lyrical alterations in the process. On April 16, 1977 “Luckenbach, Texas (Back To The Basics Of Love)” made Billboard history when it became the first single ever to debut in the upper half of the 100-position country chart.
