Published on Oct 19, 1999
When I was much younger, I remember going to my Uncle Tony’s
house for family celebrations of certain holidays. My uncle has,
for as long as I can remember, been into country music – and when I
was much younger, I absolutely hated country. So one year, while he
was happily playing his new Willie Nelson tape
Stardust for the family, I think I was trying to crawl
underneath the jukebox he once owned.
That was 20 years ago – and now that I’m older and have
developed an appreciation for Nelson’s music (as well as country in
general), I can understand what my uncle was so excited about with
this release. Were it not for this album, Nelson might have only
been known in the country music circuit as one of the leaders of
“outlaw” country music. Instead, with this collection of old pop
favorites that Nelson grew up on, he was able to bridge the gap
between the two genres of music long before the term “crossover”
would be used to describe an artist. Recently re-released with two
additional tracks, it is an album that’s sure to send people
scrambling to replace their well-worn records and cassettes.
Nelson’s vocal delivery might not always be the strongest, but
often he makes up in emotion what he lacks in style. It is
interesting to hear Nelson take on songs like “Unchained Melody”
and give them his own unique spin. While there’s the slimmest of
chances that he’ll knock the Righteous Brothers’ version out of
your memory, Nelson does a respectable job on this song, as well as
the others on
Stardust.
If you’re not very familiar with the source material, you’d
swear that Nelson wrote songs like “Georgia On My Mind” and
“Scarlet Ribbons,” the latter one of the two rediscovered tracks
recorded during these sessions and added to the CD. But the fact
is, Nelson didn’t write note one on
Stardust; all of these tracks are covers – and almost every
one of them are performed so lovingly that Nelson has succeeded in
making the songs his own. From Nelson’s unique vocal stylings to
his picking on his beat-to-hell classical guitar, listening to
these tracks unfold is pure magic.
How do you pick one or two songs off
Stardust to highlight as tracks to make sure you listen to?
Simply put, I can’t; from the title track all the way through
“Someone To Watch Over Me” (the track that ended the original
release of
Stardust), this whole album is a must-experience wonder. The
only miscue, in fact, comes on Nelson’s cover of Johnny Nash’s “I
Can See Clearly Now”. The original reggae flavor of the song is
gone, and Nelson just doesn’t seem to ever get into a groove with
this one. Still, we’re talking one mistake – and it’s a late
addition, so that’s not a bad average at all.
If
Stardust did anything for Nelson, it widened his exposure to
an entirely new market. Had it not been for this track, I’d
question if later songs like “On The Road Again” would have become
smash hits – or whether tracks like “To All The Girls I’ve Loved
Before,” his duet with Julio Iglesias, would ever have happened.
Stardust turned Nelson from an “outlaw” to a pop songsmith –
and for that, we should all be thankful.