Tonight's guest on The Daily Show is Willie Nelson and the panelists on The Nightly Show are Lavell Crawford, Dean Obeidallah, and Shenaz Treasury.
Willie Nelson is a singer-songwriter, musician, guitarist, author, poet, actor, and activist. He is on tonight to discuss his latest book
It's a Long Story: My Life
The definitive autobiography of Willie Nelson
"Unvarnished. Funny. Leaving no stone unturned."
. . . So say the publishers about this book I've written.
What I say is that this is the story of my life, told as clear as a Texas sky and in the same rhythm that I lived it.
It's a story of restlessness and the purity of the moment and living right. Of my childhood in Abbott, Texas, to the Pacific Northwest, from Nashville to Hawaii and all the way back again. Of selling vacuum cleaners and encyclopedias while hosting radio shows and writing song after song, hoping to strike gold.
It's a story of true love, wild times, best friends, and barrooms, with a musical sound track ripping right through it.
My life gets lived on the road, at home, and on the road again, tried and true, and I've written it all down from my heart to yours.
Signed,
Willie Nelson
The conversational tone echoes Nelson's singing style. It's natural, as if you were sitting across from the 10-time Grammy winner in his tour bus. As he spins his yarn, you can picture him occasionally puffing on a marijuana e-cigarette.
Nelson, who recently announced that his Willie's Reserve boutique cannabis brand will soon go on the market, goes into his renowned use of weed here, including his tale of smoking a joint on the roof of the White House. "Unlike booze, (pot) never made me nasty or violent," he writes.
Nelson's singing style comes across in the telling and adds to the authenticity of the memoir. As a boy, Nelson is drawn to Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Ernest Tubb, all of whom sang conversationally.
As a pre-teen, he begins playing guitar in a polka band, then in a country swing band with his sister Bobbie and her husband, while also working at a radio station. He also sells encyclopedias before and after heading to Nashville in 1960.
Fans of his music will especially enjoy his insights into the songwriting process. "When songs fall from the sky," Nelson writes, "all I can do is catch them before they land."
Unable to achieve success on his own terms in Nashville, Nelson returns to Texas. "In Nashville, I'd caught hell for my idiosyncratic singing," he writes. "For years, I'd heard producers tell me that my phrasing was off."
But while recording 1973's Shotgun Willie, famed producer Jerry Wexler tells Nelson "your phrasing reminds me of Ray Charles and Sinatra."
What others considered a fault, Wexler "was calling an asset," Nelson writes.
Willie Nelson has quite a 'Story' to tell
He also released a new song with Merle Haggard titled It's All Going to Pot. It was released, as you might expect on 4/20 :D Enjoy!
Lavell Crawford
is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He is best known for playing Huell in Breaking Bad
Dean Obeidallah
is an American comedian of Palestinian-Italian descent.
Shenaz Treasury
is an Indian model, travel writer and actress. She is currently a recurring contributor and panelist on The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore.
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