The album "Out of Hand", which climbed to #6 on the Billboard country album chart, has since become one of the most critically lauded country albums of the 1970s. "Village Voice" critic Robert Christgau gave the album an A- saying that it "was the best regular issue country LP I've heard in about five years." "Rolling Stone" gave it high praise as well, stating that, "With practitioners like Stewart around, honky-tonk—and rockabilly—may not be dead yet." Thom Jurek of AllMusic later gave the album five of five stars and stated that a "strong case could be made for "Out of Hand" as one of the Top 100 country records of all time. It might be in this writer's Top Ten!" Country music critic Bill Malone called "Out of Hand" "one of the greatest honky-tonk country albums ever recorded."