Diamonds & Dirt is the fifth studio album by American singer-songwriter Rodney Crowell, released in 1988. His fifth studio album, it was his second release for Columbia Records. The album was his most successful, achieving RIAA gold certification. All five of its singles reached nomber one on the Billboard country charts, setting a record for the most number-one hits from a country album. In order of release, they were "It's Such a Small World" (a duet with then-wife Rosanne Cash), "I Couldn't Leave You If I Tried", "She's Crazy for Leavin", "After All This Time", and a cover of Harlan Howard's "Above and Beyond (The Call of Love)".

The album was later reissued by Columbia Legacy with three bonus tracks.

Production Diamonds & Dirt was Crowell's first album recorded entirely in Nashville and the first aimed squarely at a country audience.Anon. "Country concert series opens soon." Aiken (SC) Standard 2 Apr 1989: 11 It was produced by Tony Brown and Crowell.

Critical reception The Rolling Stone Album Guide called the album "a stirring treatise on the quest for understanding and balance in a relationship." No Depression wrote that the songs are "played by a band that, in its day, rivaled the Desert Rose Band and Dwight Yoakam’s backing unit as the tightest pseudo-honky-tonkers in country music." Reviewing the reissue, The A.V. Club wrote that the album "still sounds pretty good ... especially in light of the sort of unnatural, reverb-laden late-'80s production that makes everything go 'poof'." Spin deemed it "a traditional country record [on which Crowell] ends ups rocking harder than ever before."

Track listing All songs written by Rodney Crowell, except where noted.

Personnel Eddie Bayers – drums Barry Beckett – piano, organ Rosanne Cash – background vocals Rodney Crowell – lead vocals, acoustic guitar Glen Duncan – fiddle Paul Franklin – steel guitar Vince Gill – background vocals Russ Kunkel – drums Mark O'Connor – fiddle, mandolin Michael Rhodes – bass guitar Vince Santoro – background vocals Preston Smith – harmonica, background vocals Steuart Smith – electric guitar

Charts

Weekly charts Chart (1988–89) Peak position Canadian Country Albums (RPM) 9

Year-end charts Chart (1988) Position US Top Country Albums (Billboard) 35 Chart (1989) Position US Top Country Albums (Billboard) 7 Chart (1990) Position US Top Country Albums (Billboard) 61

References