Jessta James Releases Desperado (B-side), a Second Version of the Song That Opens 90 Proof
Jessta James Releases Desperado (B-side), a Second Version of the Song That Opens 90 Proof
An American Outlaw Country Artist Follows His March Album with a Steady Run of Singles
Jessta James released Desperado (B-side) on 2 October 2026. It is a second version of the outlaw country song that opens his album 90 Proof. At 3 minutes 7 seconds, it runs 16 seconds shorter than the album cut. It is also the latest step in a year that has seen a new single from him every few weeks.
Jessta James’s Desperado (B-side) sits in the playlist below with this desk’s country, Americana and alt-country, and the rest of his coverage sits on his artist profile. Desperado (B-side) reached MusicDrops.News through PopHits.Co Music Charts, which verifies independent artists and places their releases across its network of music news desks. Press play, then read on for where the song came from.
Before Desperado (B-side), Jessta James Built His Montana Outlaw Sound From Country, Rock and Hip-Hop
Jessta James grew up in Bozeman, Montana, in the United States. He was raised on Hank Williams Sr. and the outlaw country that came after him. Rock and Southern rock arrived in high school, and hip-hop after that. He did not write his first song until he was 24. In those early years he was also working construction, putting in 50-hour weeks around the music.
His first album, Time to Get Right, came out in 2013 and mixed country, rock, blues, hip-hop and soul. Two albums followed together in 2016, Lawless: Day and Lawless: Night. Then came No Hero in 2021, Long Way Home in 2023 and Chase the Storm in 2024. His recent records come out on Dark Highway Records.
He calls the result Montana Outlaw Music, and plenty of listeners have found it. If That Ain’t Country has passed 4.9 million plays on Spotify, and Loaded Gun is close to 3 million. His artist page now draws more than 250,000 monthly listeners.
Desperado (B-side) Gives the Opening Song of Jessta James’s 90 Proof a Second Life as a Single
Then came 90 Proof, on 20 March 2026, with 13 songs, and Desperado is the first of them. The singles Paved in Gold and Crazy Time had come out ahead of it, in February and March. The B-side version of Desperado came out seven months after the album, as a single of its own.
It fits a pattern. This year he has put out alternative versions of several 90 Proof songs. Among them are Country Queen, Tornado, When I’m Gone and Wantin’ Eyes. The Country Queen version alone has passed a million plays.
Jessta James, credited as Jesse Covin, wrote and sang it, then produced, recorded, mixed and mastered it himself and designed the artwork. The result keeps the dusty, plainspoken feel of his outlaw records. In its first five weeks it passed 28,000 plays on Spotify.
The name carries history. The Eagles built their 1973 album Desperado around the Old West and dressed as an outlaw gang for its cover. Its title song, a ballad by Glenn Frey and Don Henley, was never released as a single. Even so, it became one of their best-known songs. Jessta James has now released his Desperado twice.
The outlaw idea has history too. Waylon Jennings was at the centre of the 1970s outlaw movement. Those country artists won their creative freedom outside the Nashville system. In 1976 he shared Wanted! The Outlaws with Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter and Tompall Glaser, and it became the first country album certified platinum. Jessta James takes that freedom about as far as it goes. His own name is the only one on this record.
Jessta James Followed Desperado (B-side) With Outlaw Ways and Bitter End Within a Month
The run did not stop there. Outlaw Ways followed on 16 October and Bitter End on 30 October. So the B-side opened a stretch of three singles in four weeks, and Outlaw Ways has already passed 45,000 plays. Both are new songs rather than reworkings of 90 Proof tracks. She Want It All and When I Do, from the summer, were new songs too, and She Want It All has passed 390,000 plays.
Away from the studio, he runs Bad West Apparel, the outlaw merch line that sits alongside the music.
So who is it for? First, listeners who like their country with an outlaw streak, and fans of the Eagles’ Old West records. Then there is anyone curious about how one song changes between an album cut and a B-side. Start with Desperado on 90 Proof, then play the B-side straight after it to hear the second version for yourself.
MusicDrops.News’s curator team: “We added Desperado (B-side) to our Country, Americana, Alt-Country playlist. It gives the list a Montana outlaw edge it did not have before.”
Hear Desperado (B-side) on Apple Music too. Follow Jessta James on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook, and find his merch at Bad West Apparel.
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