After years of Texas chart-hits and sold out shows, Aaron Watson returns with his strongest offering to date, Angels and Outlaws, and his sights firmly set on the national stage.

With the April 1st release of Angels & Outlaws – his eighth under his own independent banner, Big Label Records – the Abilene-based artist steps up to the plate and knocks it out of the park with a career-defining collection of 15 pure-country songs that celebrate his deep roadhouse roots and push his music into some intriguing new corners. To Watson, the album represents a creative career high. To everyone within hearing distance, Angels & Outlaws represents the freshest musical breeze to blow out of Texas in a long, long time.

Angels & Outlaws kicks off with "Tulsa," a revved-up and re-tooled Waylon Jennings chestnut, and closes with "That's What I Like About a Country Song," a classic Lone Star-shuffle throwdown with co-producer Ray Benson and fellow Texas troubadours Jack Ingram, Kevin Fowler and Roger Creager joining in. In between are some of Watson's finest songs, carved from stages and well-worn dancefloors across the southwest. From the title song, inspired by the legendary love affair of Johnny Cash and June Carter, to the shotgun sentiment of "Wake Up and Smell the Coffee," to an out-of-left-field, fiddle-drenched cover of John Mayer's "The Heart of Life," Angels & Outlaws celebrates Watson's all-American artistry as well as his stubborn independent streak.