You never know when inspiration is going to strike, which is why Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard’s biggest duet hit came to be in the middle of the night in a half-asleep daze. Decades after releasing their No. 1 country hit in 1983, the music legends recalled the fateful night Nelson came pounding on Haggard’s bus door asking him to record.
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By the next morning, the studio was shipping the future Grammy Award-winning record off to the Big Apple.
Willie Nelson Gave Merle Haggard a 5 a.m. Wake Up Call
In a video posted to Willie Nelson’s YouTube channel, the Redheaded Stranger and Merle Haggard discussed the impromptu recording of “Pancho and Lefty.” The folk ballad about a pair of star-crossed ne’er-do-wells, one of whom mysteriously evaded the federales while his partner met his match on the deserts down in Mexico was originally written by Townes Van Zandt, although Emmylou Harris had a particularly well-known and beloved version of the song, too.
It was Harris’ version that inspired Nelson to cut his rendition of Van Zandt’s iconic track in the first place. Nelson and Haggard were nearly finished recording their duo album when they realized they didn’t have a single-worthy hit. Nelson’s daughter, Lana, showed him Harris’ version of “Pancho and Lefty,” and Nelson was hooked. Haggard, on the other hand? He was tired. After going on a cayenne pepper drink fast for ten days and working on the album non-stop for five days and five nights without any sleep, Haggard was catching up on some much-needed rest on his bus when his recording partner came pounding on the door.
“It was Willie,” Haggard said. “I went out there, and he said, ‘I think I found us a song.’ He had it written on a paper bag. It was torn open. And it was about this long, and there was more words than I’d ever seen in my life. He said, ‘The band’s about got it. Let’s go in and cut it. So, we did.’”
The Record Was Off To New York City The Next Day
After Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard laid their vocals on “Pancho and Lefty,” Haggard returned to his bus and went back to sleep. The next morning, he came back into the studio where they cut the vinyl. Haggard asked if he could record his vocals on the song again, seemingly forgetting that he had already done so. (It was late, after all.) “They said, ‘Hell, it’s on the way to New York,’” Haggard recalled. “I had no idea what I’d done. I didn’t know whether I was in key or if it made sense or anything.” Fortunately for Haggard, he was a pro and was able to lay album-worthy vocals even in a sleepy stupor.
The pair opted to use “Pancho and Lefty” as the title track for their 1983 album, which also featured a music video in which Nelson is Pancho and Haggard is Lefty. Lana Nelson, who inspired her dad to record their version of Townes Van Zandt’s classic song, directed the video. The album, the title track, and the music video were all instant hits. Seven months after they released Pancho and Lefty, the title track hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart. Nearly four decades later, the Grammy Hall of Fame inducted the song into its ranks.
Not bad for something the outlaw country heroes recorded in the wee hours of the morning, post-cayenne cleanse.
Photo by Mediapunch/Shutterstock
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