First Appeared at The Music Box,
July 2002, Volume 9, #7
Written by John Metzger
Among songwriters, Townes Van Zandt is a legend. Artists from Steve Earle to Willie Nelson have
long paid tribute to the Texas-born poet, who died of a heart attack five years ago at the age of
52. Among the general population, however, Van Zandt is far less known, perhaps due to his sporadic
output and nomadic existence on the fringes of society. His words were simple, his stories bleak.
And the dark truths he revealed seemed perfectly suited for the stark, intimate settings of the
smoky blues bars and folk cafes that he often frequented.
Fortunately, it’s the quiet, acoustic renditions from which The Best of Townes Van Zandt
is composed. Some tracks are taken from Van Zandt’s early recordings, while others capture the bard
in a live setting. Either way, the album is a haunted affair that delves deep into the pitfalls of
life itself. Even at their most touching — the tender To Live’s to Fly or the upbeat If I
Needed You — Van Zandt’s songs seem hinged to the dark depression that often cloaked the singer.
Still, he was a master storyteller and wordsmith, and it’s hard not to deeply connect with the
emotions so strongly conveyed through his lyrics. From the nightmarish vision of love and life in
Our Mother the Mountain to the distanced relationship of Tower Song, Van Zandt captures
the agony that life can sometimes deliver, albeit with a poet’s eye for the tragic beauty that often
comes with it.
