Willie Nelson has been singing On The Road Again for decades. But with his upcoming album Last Leaf On The Tree, it seems like he’s eyeing the end of the road.
Don’t get me wrong: The Red-Headed Stranger-turned-grey-headed icon’s upcoming release isn’t being billed as his final album. And given the way Nelson can (and does) churn them out — not to mention the amount of stuff he surely has in the can — it likely won’t be. But boy, it sure seems like it could be one, based on covers of Warren Zevon’s Keep Me In Your Heart, Flaming Lips’ Do You Realize?? and other songs with more than a whiff of mortality and finality. Then again, the Tom Waits title cut — which you can hear below — is an ode to stubbornness, resilience, staying power and longevity, so what do I know? Check out the official statement below and see what you think:
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Last Leaf On The Tree is Willie Nelson’s 76th solo studio album and his 153rd album overall, according to Texas Monthly‘s All Willie Nelson Albums Ranked list. It marks the first time he’s worked with his son Micah Nelson in the producer’s chair, though the two frequently perform together onstage. Micah has also been part of family-oriented albums such as 2017’s Willie And The Boys (along with older brother Lukas Nelson) and 2021’s The Willie Nelson Family.
The album comes on the heels of a banner year for Willie that saw him win two Grammys including Best Country Album, the release of three separate studio albums and a book, plus the amazing two-night Long Story Short: Willie Nelson 90 event at the Hollywood Bowl that featured more than 40 guest artists celebrating Willie’s 90th birthday. November also saw Willie inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame, one of the few honours he had not yet received in his legendary career.
Waits initially released the first single Last Leaf on his 2011 album Bad As Me, with Rolling Stones legend Keith Richards singing along. Willie covers Richards elsewhere on the album, and he revisits the Waits songbook for House Where Nobody Lives. But on Last Leaf, Willie fittingly sings alone, summoning a bittersweet spirit that recalls the title track of Nelson’s 2018 self-titled album Last Man Standing. Willie, who turned 91 in April, has forthrightly addressed the finality of life in recent years, and Micah tapped into that as producer. “There are little side-quests,” Micah says, “but that became the through-line — facing death with grace.”
Micah, says he took a “sculptor’s approach” to producing the album. “It’s an approach that I really love and have used a lot over the years — just throwing the clay down and stepping back, then maybe adding a little more, and then maybe shaving down here, and kind of building the tracks that way.” Micah handled most of the instrumental work: Per the album credits, he played more than two dozen instruments, from guitars and pianos to “sticks and branches, logs and dead leaves.” He also illustrated the cover and helped animate the Last Leaf video alongside his wife, Alexandra Dascalu Nelson.
Micah, 34, also helped identify tracks by younger generations of songwriters that suited his father’s voice and personality. Among them are Do You Realize??, one of psychedelic indie band Flaming Lips’ best-known songs; Lost Cause, a standout from Beck’s landmark 2002 album Sea Change; and If It Wasn’t Broken by acclaimed Los Angeles folk-punk artist Sydney Lyndella Ward, aka Sunny War. “Willie singing If It Wasn’t Broken is the sweetest and greatest thing that’s ever happened to me as writer and musician,” Ward says. “I used to play that song on the Venice Beach boardwalk and would have never imagined back then that Willie Nelson would ever even hear it. I feel grateful and inspired.”
Willie’s longtime harmonica player Mickey Raphael recommended the late Warren Zevon’s Keep Me In Your Heart, which fits squarely into the album’s central theme — as does the meditative mantra Come Ye, from jazz great Nina Simone’s 1967 album High Priestess Of Soul. Willie also sings two songs written by longtime friend Neil Young: Are You Ready For The Country from 1972’s Harvest, and the impressionistic six-minute classic Broken Arrow from Buffalo Springfield’s 1967 album Buffalo Springfield Again. And Richards, who was among guests for Nelson’s 90th-birthday bash, is represented with the fascinating Robbed Blind from his 2015 album Crosseyed Heart.
Also featured at the Hollywood Bowl shows was Micah’s own rendition (with legendary producer and musician Daniel Lanois) of The Ghost, which Willie wrote in 1962 and recorded in 1967. Willie revives the song near the end of Last Leaf On The Tree. There’s also a new Willie / Micah co-write, Color Of Sound, and Willie’s rendition of Micah’s song Wheels from a 2017 album released under Micah’s musical moniker Particle Kid.
Willie most often records his parts at Pedernales Studios near his home outside of Austin, but this time he traveled to Venice, California, and joined Micah at the Hen House, a studio that has been central to Micah’s recording career for a decade. Willie plays his trusty acoustic guitar Trigger throughout. Guest musicians on the album include Raphael, Lanois on pedal steel, and former Doors drummer John Densmore and Senegalese musician Magatte Sow on percussion.
Willie Nelson & Family will co-headline the final leg of this year’s Outlaw Music Festival Tour with Bob Dylan, John Mellencamp and others across the Midwest and Northeast in September. The tour concludes Sept. 21 with the annual Farm Aid benefit concert in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., with guests including Neil Young, Dave Matthews, Mavis Staples, Nathaniel Rateliff, Charley Crockett and Lukas Nelson with The Travelin’ McCourys.
Willie Nelson | Last Leaf On The Tree
1 | Last Leaf (written by Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan)
2 | If It Wasn’t Broken (written by Sydney Lyndella Ward)
3 | Lost Cause (written by Beck David Hansen)
4 | Come Ye (written by Nina Simone)
5 | Keep Me In Your Heart (written by Warren Zevon & Jorge Calderon)
6 | Robbed Blind (written by Keith Richards)
7 | House Where Nobody Lives (written by Tom Waits)
8 | Are You Ready For The Country? (written by Neil Young)
9 | Do You Realize?? (written by Wayne Coyne / Steven Drozd / Michael Ivins / David Fridmann)
10 | Wheels (written by Micah Nelson)
11 | Broken Arrow (written by Neil Young)
12 | Color Of Sound (written by Willie Nelson & Micah Nelson)
13 | The Ghost (written by Willie Nelson)
