Willie Nelson - Dream Chaser Music CD

Review

Everything about Willie Nelson’s Dream Chaser – from its traditional-country-music ethos to its taut, 30-minute runtime – is old school. 

At 93 and on his 79th solo, studio album, Nelson opens with the title track (an also old-school tack) and looks back at a life of making music on the nostalgic, mid-tempo ballad. 

“Truth is, I’ve done it all for free,” Nelson sings while tugging on Trigger and bathed in steel, piano and harmonica. 

Nelson delivers a devastating alcoholism-as-prison song on “Fly Away;” Nelson’s Outlaw Music Festival co-conspirator Bob Dylan dropped by to co-write “I Can’t Read Your Mind;” and the long California-sober songwriter has an answer for “Whiskey River” in the form of the twangy stomper “Whiskey Wants Me To.” 

“I can’t stand the taste no more or what it makes me do/it makes me hate the things I love and think I don’t love you/I don’t wanna drink no more but the whiskey wants me to,” Nelson sings on his spryest vocal performance on the 10-cut LP. 

Nelson’s been on a bit of a rip lately—this is his 11th album since 2020—but Dream Chaser is no knock-off. This is the sound of a guy still interested in the power of music and still wanting to share it with anyone who’ll listen. 

Kristopher Weiss - jambands.com