Charlie Louvin's Cardboard Devil

Satan Is Real is a dramatic title. The album of that name, the Louvin Brothers’ 1959 gospel doomfest, lives up to it, from the title song's vindictively mournful recitative ("Preacher, tell them that Satan is real too,") through a litany of terror, sin, remorse, and moral scolding, all the way to the closing prayer for death (“I'm Ready To Go Home"). And then there's the famous album art, with its giant clearly cardboard, buck-toothed devil towering over the white-suited Louvins as flames crackle in the background—the hyperbolically campy package for the hyperbolically moralistic interior. It’s no wonder hippie authenticity-worshippers like Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris couldn't resist the Louvins. Listening to this album meant you could bathe in the salt of the earth by listening to your lifestyle condemned in sublime harmonies, then turn to the record cover, toke up, and laugh your ass off.