35 Biggest Hits

Photographers: Russ Harrington; Michael Wilson .
As the first weighty Hank Jr. overview since 2000's The Bocephus Box, 2015's double-disc 35 Biggest Hits doesn't attempt to do much more than round up his greatest hits but that's more than enough to make this one of the better Bocephus compilations ever assembled. This doesn't attempt to tell a full history, picking up the story in 1979, when "Family Tradition" inaugurated a rowdy run at the top that extended into the '90s. 35 Biggest Hits covers these 12 or so years, a decade when Hank Jr. was one of the biggest stars in country, and these singles -- including the number ones "Texas Women," "Dixie on My Mind," "All My Rowdy Friends (Have Settled Down)," "Honky Tonkin'," "I'm for Love," "Ain't Misbehavin'," "Mind Your Own Business," and "Born to Boogie," plus the perennials "Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound," "A Country Boy Can Survive," and "All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Tonight" -- not only endure, they sound prescient, the music that set the template for not only the hat acts of the '90s but the bro-country of the new millennium, so it winds up serving as a powerful testament to Hank Jr.'s own extensive influence outside of his father's shadow. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine