After diverging from his usual course for 2005's anomalous Delirium Tremelos and its melodic balladry, Ray Wylie Hubbard made a sharp turn in the other direction for the following year's Snake Farm. It's no accident that it turned out to be one of his most attention-getting albums of the era. By stripping his blend of windblown blues and outlaw country down to the bare essentials and giving his worldly wise Confucius-meets-Kerouac lyrical approach plenty of room to breathe, he turned out some of the best songs of his career, from the transcendent blues of "Rabbit" to the deliciously sleazy title track.