Willie Nelson and Family (1971)

Listening to Willie and family on my 17th anniversary. This album opens with versions of “What Can You Do to Me Now?” and “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down.” Willie’s vocals are strong, but the string arrangements cloy. There are so many better versions of these songs on other albums. I wasn’t expecting to find a Hank Williams tune on this album. This version of Hank’s “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” sounds like the domesticated Disney version. I’m actually shocked that Willie would do this with syrupy strings and triangles tinkling. I’m afraid this version might make Hank cry, but I suspect Chet Atkins is to blame, not Willie, for adding the strings. The strings probably made Willie cry, too. Just as I’ve said that Willie should stay away from Paul Simon songs, I think he should avoid JT as well. I don’t think anyone can improve on JT’s own versions of “Fire and Rain,” and this one just didn’t need to be re-done. And for some reason, Willie is trying to sound like JT. That’s so un-like Willie, who always seems to sound just like himself. Track 5 is where Willie starts sounding like himself. Willie and family get funky on the swingin’ gospel “Kneel at the Feet of Jesus.” Willie has several gospel albums, but they are more sober gospel tunes. I’d love to hear a whole album of rowdy gospel tunes like this. This version of “I’m a Memory” is solid despite the strings. I confess I kind of like the cheesy horns. Track 7, a version of Harlan Howard’s “Yours Love,” may be the most interesting song on the album. The only other place I have seen it so far is on the 2006 album “Songbird.” It is a hopeful, optimistic sort of prayer. Instead of a foolish promise, it’s a prayer for faithfulness. A prayer for lasting love. It is one of the few places where Willie seems to be praying, asking for his love to last. And he seems to mean it as the song rises pleasantly in intensity. He chants the verses like a prayer, and the incantatory effect builds momentum. “I Can Cry Again” is new to me; this is the first time I have seen it in close to 100 albums. It’s always good to see another song about crying from the crying cowboy. This song needs the naked treatment; the strings and back-up vocals need to be stripped. The vocals remind me of “Red Headed Stranger,” but the arrangement drowns them out. Only Willie would think it was “good to see” he could cry again. Only Willie would be “glad to say” that he can cry again. “Now I’ll return to life and live again.” For Willie, crying is living. Living is crying. If you ain’t cryin’, you ain’t livin’. Sort of like the skier motto: if you’re not falling down, you’re not really skiing. If you’re not getting hurt enough to cry, you’re not really living. It’s good to cry. Willie is glad to cry. Previously, his “pride would not permit [his] tears to fall”; he “walked through burning hell and never cried at all.” But now he’s happy once again because he can cry. He’s not happy unless he’s crying. Not sure how this fits with his stoic, Buddhist philosophy of accepting with a smile whatever comes his way. Here he suggests that might not work. That crying is important. I haven’t seen “That’s Why I Love Her So” on any previous albums. Again, Willie’s voice is “Yesterday’s Wine”-esque, but the strings taint the track. Merle Haggard’s “Today I Started Loving You Again” is another new song to my ears. I’m not sure why he hasn’t re-visited this song on more albums. He has so many hidden gems like this that beg to be re-done without strings. It reminds me of George Jones’s “He Stopped Loving her Today,” but in reverse. He thought he was over her. But today he sings, “What a fool I was to think I could get by with only these few teardrops that I’ve cried. I should have known the worst was yet to come and that cryin’ time for me had just begun.” So the day he starts crying in earnest for her is the day he starts loving her again. So here, again, he associates crying with loving. He cries because he loves. The absence of crying indicates the absence of loving. It is only in crying that we truly live and love. Again, the strings kill another great vocal performance. Some hidden gems here, but overall, not an untenable top ten album. Worth buying on ITUNES for $9.99, which is the only place I could find it, used or otherwise. Even on LP, it’s hard to find. EBAY has some, but they can be pricey. For now, ITUNES is the way to go, and I suppose Willie actually gets some money for it that way, whereas if I buy it used he gets nada.