| Battleground | |
| Type: | studio |
| Artist: | Gary Stewart |
| Cover: | Battleground (Gary Stewart album).jpg |
| Released: | 1990 |
| Genre: | Country |
| Label: | HighTone |
| Producer: | Roy Dea |
| Prev Title: | Brand New |
| Prev Year: | 1988 |
| Next Title: | I'm a Texan |
| Next Year: | 1993 |
Battleground is an album by the American musician Gary Stewart, released in 1990.[1] [2] It was his second album for HighTone Records.[3] The album was more commercially successful than his 1988 comeback, Brand New.[4]
The album was produced by Roy Dea.[5] "Let's Go Jukin'" was written with Dickey Betts. "You're the Reason I'm Living" is a cover of the Bobby Darin song.[6] "Nothin' but a Woman" is a cover of the Robert Cray song.[7]
The Boston Globe wrote that "the album dwarfs much of today's country radio fare—and Stewart is a true master at work."[8] The Chicago Tribune called the album "a convincing illustration of why Stewart is a king of that increasingly rare breed: the honky-tonkers." The Dallas Morning News noted that Battleground "has a raw, hollow, sound that immediately conjures up a dark bar."[9]
The Buffalo News determined that, "scratchy and scrawny as his voice is, there is something quite compelling about the way this country/blues/rock veteran puts across a song."[10] The Fresno Bee listed "Nothin' but a Woman" as the second best country cover song of 1990.[11] Robert Christgau concluded that Stewart's "r&r groove is sharp-witted where Steve Earle's is muscle-headed and the average Nashville cat's just mechanical."