Culture
Review

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams

Christianity Today October 4, 2011

Style: Classic country honky-tonk; compare to Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, George Jones

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams

Legacy

October 4, 2011

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams

Legacy

October 4, 2011

Top tracks: “The Love That Faded,” “I Hope You Shed a Million Tears,” “The Sermon on the Mount”

When Hank Williams died in 1953, he left behind a briefcase of song lyrics without accompanying melodies. Bob Dylan eventually bought them and farmed them out to a Who’s Who of contemporary musicians—including Norah Jones, Jack White, Lucinda Williams, Merle Haggard, and Sheryl Crow—who wrote a dozen new songs in the classic Williams honky-tonk style. Dylan’s “The Love That Faded” is a rueful highlight. Haggard’s “The Sermon on the Mount” is a straightforward country hymn, while Vince Gill’s and Rodney Crowell’s “I Hope You Shed a Million Tears” (“The Bible says forgive you, but that’s something I can’t do”) illustrates the conflicted flip side of the hellraiser who couldn’t stop thinking about heaven.

Copyright © 2011 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

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