7/31/2023 0 Comments Last man sitting buy![]() ![]() Willie Nelson and Buddy Cannon first connected in 2008 and since that time, Cannon has been Nelson’s main producer. The truth is, he’s in no hurry he’s well occupied with the here and now: “Go on in front if you’re in such a hurry,” he offers, “Like Heaven ain’t waitin’ for you.” The singer says he doesn’t want to be the last survivor among his allies, then thinks twice. In the opening track, “Last Man Standing,” Nelson sings: “It’s getting hard to watch my pals check out/It cuts like a wore out knife/One thing I’ve learned about running the road/Is forever don’t apply to life/Waylon and Ray and Merle and ol’ Norro/Lived just as fast as me/I’ve still got a lot of good friends left/And I wonder who the next will be.”ĭespite that rumination, the song doesn’t feel like a requiem: The music works in an entirely different mood and direction, kicking off like a stampede of race horses, headed for a rendezvous at the liveliest honky-tonk in town. This time the line of commemorations has grown. ![]() With its understanding of life as something that is both evanescent and reverberant, Last Man Standing picks up in the territory where last year’s God’s Problem Child left off: The closing song, “He Won’t Ever Be Gone,” was a tribute to a fallen friend, Merle Haggard. “There’s hope in the new album,” says Buddy Cannon. ![]() Last Man Standing is full of both lively beauty and hard truth, but it also offers grace notes. We live until we die - you, me, Willie Nelson, everybody - and will go through loving and harsh realities that don’t hesitate. He does something rather different that digs deeper: He demonstrates that every new season, every new night, offers a way forward with fresh promises - maybe joyous, maybe hurtful - until the end. Willie Nelson doesn’t preach or chide he doesn’t even claim the wisdom of his years as an exemplar for us all. Perhaps no other American artist unifies so many disparate listeners across a troubled land in this time. Nelson’s perseverance is not only extraordinary but heartening. He still performs something like one hundred shows per year, and records and releases an average of two top-rate albums per year. The song is a wry concession to an overshadowing truth that accompanies Willie Nelson and his music every step at this stage of his life: He’s an 84-year-old man who is one of America’s most preternaturally active and creative artists, and he keeps on going. After a moment’s consideration, he adds: “On second thought, maybe I do.” Willie Nelson doesn’t want to be the last man standing, he declares on the title track of this new album, comprising songs co-written with producer Buddy Cannon. ![]()
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