Willie Nelson - Heroes Review

On his millionth album, give or take, Willie Nelson is his usual self: loping through a set of well-chosen originals and unlikely covers (Coldplay's "The Scientist"!?) with casual virtuosity. This time, Nelson has packed his recording studio with friends and family, including his son Lukas, who sings on nine songs. The results are mixed: In "Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die," featuring guest vocals by Kris Kristofferson, Jamey Johnson and, yep, Snoop Dogg, the stoner's bonhomie is audible. But the stark beauty of solo songs like the weeper “That’s All There Is to This Song” makes you long for more Willie, less Willie and Friends.
...full text Everyone remembers the most galvanizing moment of this year's Grammys - when the telecast cut to commercial and, over a Chipotle ad, we heard a studio recording of Willie Nelson singing Coldplay's "The Scientist."

You can relive that very special Grammy moment (minus the environmentally themed animation and Chipotle logo) at the climax of Nelson's new album, "Heroes," a mostly satisfying grab-bag of celebrity duets, nepotism, odes to wacky weed and interpretations of everyone from Bob Wills to Pearl Jam.

It doesn't take a "Scientist" to realize that anybody who can interpret the fast-stepping Western swing of "Home in San Antone" and a Chris Martin emo ballad and make them sound like they belong on the same album still merits his national-treasure status....full text Willie Nelson‘s new album ‘Heroes’ is an eclectic collection of ambient emo-country, Texas swing and jazzy ballads. The singer isn’t confined by the country genre on any of the 14 songs. No one will ever doubt his credentials, so even songs like ‘The Scientist’ feel like one Hank Sr. may have chosen decades ago. OK, perhaps that’s an exaggeration, but few other singers could give the political lyric the proper twang.

‘Every Time He Thinks of Her’ is one highlight on this project, in stores May 15. His son Lukas Nelson — who is deserving of having his name on the album jacket — joins his father for the most pure three minutes on the project....full text At the very end of an absolutely swinging version of the 1943 roots gem "Home in San Antone" on Willie Nelson's new album, Heroes, you can hear the singer add, "that's a great track." He's right, it is a great track. If he had said it about the album as a whole, he would have been right as well. In Heroes, Nelson, his sons, and a friend or two have put together a compilation of some things old and some things new and produced themselves one great album. But then it's Willie Nelson, what else would you expect.
The album opens with a new take on the Wayne Carson composition "A Horse Called Music," the title song of 1989 Nelson album. It's a great song, and here he is joined by Merle Haggard for one hell of a duet. It is an auspicious beginning.
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