Key Points
- Willie Nelson, 92, gets emotional over his songs “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground” and “Always on My Mind.”
- Nelson says, “Music brings us back together. Politics separates everybody.”
- “Always On My Mind” became a hit after it was initially rejected and won three Grammy awards.
After turning 92 this year, country icon Willie Nelson is looking back at the songs that helped make his decades-long career.
In a new interview with GQ, he revealed his two songs that always make him emotional, and he isn’t the only one — these songs are so meaningful to fans all over the world, too.
Nelson was asked what songs still get him “misty” when he hears or plays them, and he admitted that there are actually two in his catalog that he keeps coming back to.
“‘Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground’ is one. ‘Always on My Mind’ is another,” he said.
He also added which songs by other artists make him emotional, too, including anything by Hank Williams or Bob Wills.
“There’s a whole lot of good music out there,” Nelson said. “I still think music is what brings us all together. Politics separates everybody. Music brings us back together.”
The Story Behind Willie Nelson’s ‘Always On My Mind’
In his book Nashville Songwriter: The Inside Stories Behind Country Music’s Greatest Hits, journalist Jake Brown spoke with Wayne Carson, one of the writers on “Always On My Mind,” who shared the story of how the song came to be.
At first, Carson wrote the song without a bridge, until his producer, Chips Moman, suggested that the song needed one. When he found himself stumped, writers Johnny Christopher and Mark James, who just so happened to be at the studio at the right time, helped him find the right words.
They were convinced that it was going to be a hit, because as Carson said, it’s about an emotion that is “one of those things that, universally, everybody on the planet has been there.” So both Carson and Moman were shocked when they brought the song to record producer Fred Foster, only to be shot down.
“I remember the last thing Chips said about it was, ‘He’s going to rue the day he ever turned that song down, I’m telling you right now, Wayne. That song is a big, huge song,’” Carson added.
As it turns out, Chips was right, and “Always On My Mind” would go on to become one of Nelson’s biggest songs and also won three Grammy awards.
