Milk Cow Blues

Country-outlaw icon Willie Nelson seems to have a cannabis-addled grin plastered on his dusty mug most of the time, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t sing the blues. For this crossover celebration of feelin’ bad, Willie rounds up a juke joint’s worth of blues all-stars for assistance, including B.B. King, Jonny Lang, and Keb’ Mo’. Together they remind us that the slow groove of “The Thrill Is Gone” and the boogie-woogie piano of “Kansas City” are timeless and can only gain a cool new dimension from Willie’s idiosyncratic warble. A country legend doing a whole album of blues might seem strange, but the end result will put a tear in your beer all the same.