Townes Van Zandt: Rear View Mirror Vinyl 2LP

“This intimate collection of Townes Van Zandt live recordings from 1993 is being pressed on double vinyl for the first time. The 17-song set finds Van Zandt in fine form – upbeat, gracious, apparently sober – and in good company, with fiddler Owen Cody and guitarist Danny Rowland adding a dimension of musical enhancement that never overwhelms the nuances of the material. As anyone who ever saw Van Zandt fall off a stool recognizes, there was no such thing as a typical Townes performance, but when he was good, no one working in the Texas troubadour tradition has ever been better… Listeners only familiar with this album’s higher-profile material in more popular renditions by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard (‘Pancho & Lefty’), Don Williams and Emmylou Harris (‘If I Needed You’) or Nanci Griffith and Arlo Guthrie (‘Tecumseh Valley’) may have heard the tunes, heard the words, but they haven’t really heard the songs until they’ve heard Townes.” – Fat Possum

• 1978 live recordings originally released on CD in 1993
• black double vinyl pressing
• first time on vinyl
• music label: Fat Possum 2017