“Roll Him A Joint & Make His Special Coffee” – That Was Someone’s Only Job While Willie Nelson Was Recording ‘Teatro’

Nobody does it like Willie Nelson . And by "it," I mean, quite literally, anything... The living legend has some incredible outlaw stories to his name, many of which were covered in the new Taylor Sheridan-produced docuseries called Willie Nelson & Family . I pretty much binged it over the Christmas holiday, which isn't that hard to do if you're still off and looking for something to watch, as it's a concise four episodes that each delve deep into a different era and aspect of his lengthy, legendary career. It's an incredible look into some never-before-seen footage of him too, as Willie gave the directors unprecedented access to his personal archives, and I highly recommend checking it out. And one of the funniest stories about him (that I've never heard before) came up in episode four, as producer Daniel Lanois talked about working with Willie on his 45th studio album Teatro in 1998. They recorded it all in an old movie theater named Teatro in Oxnard, California, with Emmylou Harris providing background vocals. After the success Willie had with his friends and fellow country legends The Highwaymen in the mid-80's through mid-90's, no one, even Willie himself, knew what king of record he should make next. But Lanois had an idea: "Nobody was sure what kind of a record Willie should make next. When I had a chance to meet him, we talked about the early days and what he was doing as a young musician and songwriter. And he said that they were a dance band, and they were providing music for people to have a nice time on the weekend. Maybe it's Saturday night and you just got paid... At the time, my shop was in Oxnard, California. I said to my buddy, 'Let's transform the theater into a nightclub to make Willie feel like he was in his natural habitat.'" They also brought in Willie's longtime harmonica player Mickey Raphael, as well as the aforementioned Emmylou and Willie's sister Bobbie on piano. Almost every song is a Willie Nelson original, many of which he first wrote and recorded in the 60's, and Teatro had an incredibly unique, almost atmospheric and eerie sound to it, mostly due to the sparse production and place they recorded in and the genius of Lanois' vision with it. Willie was (and is) notoriously hard to match in terms of his phrasing, because he had a very unique way of singing, modeled a lot after the old blues singers he loved growing up. It was hard for even the most talented, professional vocalists to keep up with him, though Emmylou says she somehow managed to (kind of) get the hang of it: "Rodney Crowell once said that Willie's phrasing was like fly fishing. But somehow, if you just let yourself not worry about it, it doesn't have to be perfect. It's so easy being around Willie, he put's you completely at ease." And during this particular recording process for Teatro (and I'm guessing many other Willie Nelson albums), Emmylou says he would do just one or two takes, then run back out to his bus, where he had someone whose only job was to "roll him a joint and make his special coffee": "Willie would basically do one or two takes, and then he would go back to the bus and he had somebody whose only job was to roll him a joint and make his special coffee... I'm not sure what was in the special coffee." I mean, what else do you expect from the red headed stranger? Classic... if only we could get him to share that "special" coffee recipe one day. One of the longtime fan-favorite songs of Willie's was "I Never Cared For You," which was completely reimagined for Teatro and is easily one of my favorites on the record. It perfectly captures the feeling and unique sound of the record, and I'll certainly be turning this one up with a side of just regular, plain old coffee today (unfortunately): "I Never Cared For You" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmdwsLtNx2E