Waylon Jennings & Willie Nelson

By 1978, Jennings and Nelson had attained country music superstar status. Jennings had three #1 country albums in a row, and his most recent, Ol' Waylon in 1977, included what turned out to be the biggest hit single of his career, "Luckenbach, Texas (Back to the Basics of Love)". Nelson, who had taken a verse on the Jennings single, had enjoyed blockbuster success of his own with the release of his 1975 West Texas epic Red Headed Stranger and did again with Stardust in 1978. After so many one-off collaborations and tours, it was inevitable that they would record an album of duets, although being contracted to different record labels (Waylon with RCA and Willie with Columbia) made matters difficult. According to the RCA executive Jerry Bradley, Jennings initially attempted to overdub his vocals on a few old Nelson recordings (Nelson had recorded for RCA Victor from 1965 to 1972) but struggled to do so. Instead, he approached Columbia Records in Nashville with the idea of recording an album of new duets. In a surprising show of co-operation, Columbia agreed. Jennings and Nelson had achieved great success previously, winning the Country Music Association Award for Duo of the Year for their song "Good Hearted Woman" in 1976, and were the marquee attractions on the Wanted! The Outlaws compilation, country music's first million selling album.