The universe feels real on The Turnpike Troubadours because the band resolved to let the album happen on it's own time. Moving out to the Prairie Sun recording complex in the desert country of Cotati, California, setting up in former chicken coops converted into studios, they metaphorically unplugged the clock and worked studiously through 12-hour sessions, wrapping up only when each story and every note rang true. There's "7 Oaks", recounting a life made desperate by poverty, made more vivid by an incongruous hoedown accompaniment. "Bossier City," focused on a sad mill worker who blows his pay regularly on gambling and booze.