Exclusive: Rodney Crowell Shares Acoustic Classics Album Stream

Elder statesmen of Americana Rodney Crowell will release his 19th solo album Acoustic Classics via his new imprint RC1 on Friday, July 13, and the award-winning troubadour has shared an advance stream of the extraordinary LP, available exclusively here at Paste.

Acoustic Classics finds Crowell revisiting a select few of his many contributions to the country music canon, handpicking a dozen of his most beloved songs. The album features tracks first made famous by Crowell’s fellow roots music legends, including the likes of Waylon Jennings (“Ain’t Living Long Like This”), The Oak Ridge Boys (“Leaving Louisiana In the Broad Daylight”), Bob Seger (“Shame on the Moon”), Keith Urban (“Making Memories of Us”) and Tim McGraw (“Please Remember Me”), while others are Crowell favorites (“Earthbound,” “Anything But Tame”).

In reimagining these songs, Crowell aims to capture the original spirit of each composition, riding the lightning that’s struck time and time again over the course of his decades-long career. And the storm continues, even now: Acoustic Classics also features a new, never-before-heard cut, the tender “Tennessee Wedding.”

“I spent a couple of days in the studio in late spring of this year with some of my favorite musicians and a twelve-song set of acoustic recordings of some of my better known songs—and one that has never been heard in public—and it fell into place,” Crowell tells Paste of the career-spanning Close Ties follow-up. “Who knew?”

Crowell will head to Carmel, Calif., to host his inaugural Adventures in Song songwriting camp on July 16-20, where he will share his considerable expertise alongside fellow balladeers Lisa Loeb, Joe Henry, Allen Shamblin, Brennen Leigh and Don Peake, with special guest appearances from Bernie Taupin and Benmont Tench.