This week, in celebration of Willie Nelson’s 75th birthday, Columbia/Legacy will release a four-CD, 100-song box set that chronicles his 50 plus years of recording music. The unique thing about this set, aptly titled “One Hell of a Ride,” is that it takes songs from the dozen or so record labels and collects songs from 60 albums. The 100-page, full-color booklet has an introduction by longtime harmonica player Mickey Raphael and an 8,000-word essay written by Texas journalist Joe Nick Patoski. He is also the author of a new biography titled “Willie Nelson: An Epic Life,” which is scheduled for release later this month.
The box set appropriately opens at the beginning with Nelson’s first recording from 1954 of “When I’ve Sang My Last Hillbilly Song,” a track recorded at a tiny radio station in Pleasanton where Nelson was a disc jockey. By 1959 he was in Houston where he cut “Man with the Blues” for Pappy Daley’s D Records. Nelson quickly wrote another song called “Night Life” but Pappy hated it and refused to release it, so Willie recorded it under the alias “Paul Buskirk & his Little Men.” It became a huge hit and Nelson was off and running. Nelson moved to Nashville in the early ’60s and took a job as a songwriter at Pamper Music for $50 a week. For the next decade, he would write and record songs the Nashville way, trying to fit in with the suits of Music City.
When his house burned down in the early ’70s, he moved back to Texas and lived at an abandoned dude ranch in Bandera. The band started playing area dance halls like Floores Country Store and Armadillo World Headquarters and was shocked at the size of the crowds. The decision was made to stay in Texas and the rest is history.
Although Willie has been the subject of several box sets in the past, none can compare with this collection. One cool thing about this set is that it ends where it started, with a brand new recording of “When I’ve Sang My Last Hillbilly Song” that he cut late last year for this project. I could go on for days about how fantastic this collection is but it would be so much easier if you would just buy a copy and see for yourself. My motto is, you can never have too much Nelson music in your collection.
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With more than 170 channels, XM Satellite Radio has something for everyone and now, thanks to Lauren Rissmiller from New Braunfels, they will get a taste of music from the Texas Hill Country. After graduating from New Braunfels High School, Rissmiller moved to York, Pa., to attend York College. The summer before leaving for school, she soaked up as much local music as possible and soon made the decision to forego her nursing degree for one in mass communication. She signed up for a broadcasting class and before long had her own radio show at the campus. At a music conference in New York, she attended a panel on Americana music where she met Jessie Scott, program director at XM Radio. They exchanged e-mail addresses and before long, Rissmiller was offered an internship at XM Radio. Scott is on the board of directors for the Americana Music Association and is familiar with Mattson Rainer and KNBT. Scott offered Rissmiller the chance to do her own special show for the X-Country station on Channel 12. I spoke with Rissmiller about her show and she was obviously excited about it. “The great thing about Texas music is that you can go to Gruene Hall and see fans of all ages enjoying the live music,” she said. “When I moved to the East Coast, it isn’t like that at all. Music here is very trendy and not very family oriented. So my show on XM Radio tries to embody that observation.” Rissmiller said she hopes to continue her internship during her final year of college before getting a job in some part of the music industry. “I’m really blessed that this just fell into my lap,” she said. “I have very supportive parents who are letting me follow my dream.” Rissmiller’s show will air at
6 p.m. Thursday and again at 10 a.m. Saturday and will include music that is familiar to Americana fans in our city. Naturally, I had to get Rissmiller to name her top five favorite albums and as you can see, she has great taste in music.
Her picks are: “Sticky Fingers” by the Rolling Stones, “Eat a Peach” by the Allman Brothers, “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” by Lucinda Williams, “Music from the Big Pink” by the Band and “I Feel Alright” by Steve Earle.
