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Willie Nelson interview, “Country Music” (February 1976)

Thursday, February 2nd, 2023

Willie Nelson interview “Country Music” (February 1976)

Country Music Magazine
February 1976
by Patrick Carr

We begin with an ending of sorts. We are in Nashville on a drizzly night, packed into the Municipal Auditorium like so many high-rent sardines approaching the strung-out finale of the Disk Jockey Convenion 1975.

Taken together tonight, we are perhaps the most professional audience any of these Columbia/Epic acts are likely to play for at least another year: all of us are Somebodies in the country music business, and we’are all hip to the score. The Columbia/Epic actes bounce on stage and do whatever thing they do, three numbers each, one after the other. Tammy Wynette, Mac Davis, Barbara Fairchild, David Houston… it’s very democratic but pretty soon it becomes obvious which artists are getting corporate nod right now because all you really have to do is watch the company personnel pay or not pay attention. Nevertheless, it’s a subtle affair.

But when Willie Nelson and his band of gypsies make their entrance backstage, looking for all the world like some flying wedge of curiously benign Hells Angels, subtlety goes by the board and it’s plain that this year’s Most Likely To Succeed slot has just been taken with a vengeanance: a great shaking of hands begins.

The impression is confirmed when Willie proceeds to get up onstage with his full band (all the other acts were backed by the Columbia band) and play a 40-minute set that, except for a qute seemly absence of illegal drugs and teenage nudity among the audience, might just have well be happening in Texas on the 4th of July. This is the ending of sorts, and what it means is that after telling the Nashville powers-that-be to get lost and leaving town just three short years ago, Willie Nelson has become the country music wave of the future and is now accepting Nashville’s praise and promotional efforts on his own terms.

There is a postscript, though. Three or four hours later — after another couple of hundred handshakes, after attending a very high-rent Columbia party to which his band was not invited, and after behaving like a perfect gentleman through it all — Willie gets himself down to Ernest Tubb’s Record Store and plays for two hours while most every other star in town is out at Opryland all gussied up to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Grand Ole Opry amid great pomp and ceremony of the By Invitation Only Kind.

It isn’t that Willie couldn’t have shown up at the Opry — with his current Columbia-backed status, that’s a silly notion — and it isn’t that he’s trying a reverse-chic move like one of Nashville’s several dozen I’m-so-hip-isn’t-this-earthy tipes might attemps. It’s just that his old friend and musical hero Ernest was gracious enough to invite him, and that Ernest Tubb’s Record Store is still the best place in town to get down and play straight honky tonk music for the friends and neighbors.

Apart from being a rebel against Nashville’s creative restrictions, a culture hero, a real sweetheart, a person blessed with a highly sophisticated sense of humor, and the man who first made it possible for hippies and rednecks to co-exist under the protection of his music — all of which he is — Willie Nelson has always been one other thing. He has always been a wrtier and singer of the classic country honky tonk song, which is to say that he has always had a very precise, lonely, realistic understanding of the hard ways of this vale of tears in which we all live and suffer form time to time. This is the juke box Willie.

Historicallly, this music came out of more or less, his whol career up to today (which seems somewhat more optimistic when you consider the conclusions of the Red Headed Stranger album). It’s the kind of stuff — like “Hello Walls,” “Ain’t It Funny (How Time Slips Away),” “Pretty Paper,” “Touch Me” and all those other perfectly songs — that really say it to you when you’re down and getting kicked. Willie wrote most of it in Nashville when he was a highly-reputed songwriter trying to be a singing star, simultaneously going through the usual business of divorce, marriage, divorce, marriage and consequent craziness (or is that vice versa?) and running with the likes of Faron Young, Roger Miller, Mel Tillis and other distinguished crazy people.

A segment of my Willie Nelson interview:

Willie (laughing): “I think a lot of people got to thinking that everybody had to do the same thing Hank Williams did, even die that way if necessary. And that got out of hand. I always used to think George Jones got drunk because Hank Williams did, like he really thought that was what he was uspposed to do.”

Me: “You ever do that?”

Willie: “‘Course I did. That’s the reason I know it’s done.”

Me: “You still do it?”

Willie: “I still get drunk, but I’m not really mimicking anybody now. I have my own drunken style.”

These days, see, Willie won’t talk about the personal agonies of those Nashville years without humor, but it’s all there in the songs which made him one of Nashville’s most sought-after songwriters, and it came to a head during the years — his last year in Nashville — that gave rise to his Phases and Stages album. That year was a turning point, and it is chronicled in Phases and Stages. The album is an excruciatingly universal account of the way one man and one woman deal with their divorce (”That was the year I had four or five cars totalled out and the house burned down,” says Willie), but it ends with a very significant song called “Pick Up the Tempo.” It goes like so:

People are sayin’ that time will take
care of people like me
And that I’m livin’ too fast, and
they say I can’t last for much longer
But little they see that their
thoughts of me is my savior
And little they know that the beat
ought to go just a little faster,
So pick up the tempo just a little,
and take it on home….

For a man hitting the crucial age of forty, those are important lines. They speak of an affirmation of life and a determination to triumph over its emotional problems, and they represent Willie’s decison to leave Nashville, move back home to Texas, and finally realize his potential which is, in fact, exactly what he did. “I knew I only had a few years left to do what I was gong to do, and I had to make a move,” says Willie. “I wasn’t going down there to quit. I was going down there with a purpose.” the purpose, quite simply, was first to make himself a national recording star, and then to use that power base to make damn sure that people like him could be free to make their own music their own way without having to starve in the process.

Remember, Willie has a history in this department. It was he who first chaperoned Charley Pride into the country music concept scene, bringing him on stage in Louisiana — actually kissing him right there in the spotlights – and risking God only knows what kind of backlash in the process. The risk, once taken, paid off: Charley was accepted because Willie was behind him. Similarly, Willie, used his high prestige and general likeability in country music artist circles to ease Leon Russell into the Nashville scene by surrounding him with Ernest Tubb, Roy Acuff, Jeanne Pruett and a whole galaxy of main-line performers when he was cutting the sequel to his “Hank Wilson” album.

Willie can get away with heresy because more than any other artist occupying the often-queasy ground between because more than any other artist occupying the often queasy ground between country and something else, his country credentials are in order — more to the point — he has never betrayed his roots.

So Willie arrived in Austin (where he was already a star), formed his present band around himself and his old compadre drummer Paul English (of “Me and Paul” fame), began booking his own dates and managing himself, set up that first media-shocking Picnic at Dripping Springs, connected with the local power elite in the person of Darrell Royal (coach of the University of Texas football team and a very influential citizen), and quickly assumed the role of main Godfather in the Austin scheme of things. That, incidentally, is some gig: you don’t know what a loyal crowd is until you’ve been to Austin and watched a whole clubful of liberated young things worship the ground good ol’ Willie walks on to quite embarrasing excess.

Along the way — just before that first Picnic, in fact — Ritchie Albright of the Waylors suggested that he get in touch with Neil Reshen, a New york manager and fixit person who at the time was looking to consolidate his country music holdings. Reshin already had Waylon as a client, and Willie followed suit. This action signified the arrive with the neccessary teeth for the coutlaw allliance Willie had been pondering for years, and it became a classic Beauty and the Beast operation that continues to this day.

An example of the dynamics of that Beauty and the Beast relationship:

Willie on Neil Reshen: “He’s probably the most hated and the most effective manager that I know of. He enjoys going up to those big corporations and going over their figures. He’s so sadistic, he loves to do it.”

And once again, Willie: “At least you know where you’re at with Neil. Nowhere.”

And again: “Anyone who can learn to like Neil can like anyone. It’s a challenge to like Neil.”

“Willie, how are you doing on that?”

“I’m coming along, I’m coming alone. I can stay around him a little while now.”

Althought the mere mention of Neil Reshen’s name has been known to send secretaries to the bathroom and turn grown executives into violent monsters (”He’s another of those guys I don’t understand how he lived so long with somebody really hurting him,” says Willie), you have to admit that while Willie and Waylon (”It’s like having a maddog on a leash,” says Waylon) may have been able to get out of Nashville’s grasp without him. It’s only through this man’s unspeakably vicious yet effective manner of dong business, that the outlaw bid for independent power on country music has avoided bankruptcy and actually shown a profit.

So, with the active assistance of New York Neil, Willie has established the power base he was after. It is now possible for Willie to record with Waylon or Kris or Leon (he’s planning a whole Willie/Waylon joint album), and what’s more, with the formation of Lone Star Records, he can get people like Jimmy Day, Johnny Darrell, Floyd Tillman, Billy C., Bucky Meadows, his sister Bobbie and other Texas worthies into the recording studio and, since Columbia Records pays for promotion and distribution under a joint Columbia/Lone Star deal, actually get the finished product before the public. Like Willie says, “We’re all togethe

hr, and we have the same idea about what we wnat to do, which is to do our thing our own way. I’m trying to get these guys to do for themselves what they’ve been bitching about people not doing for them.”

Willie’s long affair with the business of honky tonk music represents one considerable side of his character which may be traceable to the fact that he and his sister Bobbi (”it’s alwyas been me and her”) were raised without parents. Mr. and Mrs. Nelson divorced when Willie was a baby and Bobbi was there, and so for the first six eyars of his life Wilile was with his grandparents. For the next tne year, he was raised by his grandmoter alone, grandfather having passed away. That of coruse is a vast oversimplification, but the roots of his two divorces and highly creative loneliness must lie buried somewhere in there, just as the roots of his present, almost uncanny serenity must be located in the emotional steps he took to overcome his personal problems. Whatever, it is an absolute fact that the presnet-day Willie Nelson is most definitely not an individual still in conflict with himself.

In a sense, Willie Nelson now is in some sort of still-perceptive, still creative cruise-gear, moving through a world of incredibly high pressure with almost perfect equilibrium. You can hear this feeling on the Red Headed Stranger album (a concept suggested and assisted by his wife Connie, with whom he does in fact seem quite happy) and you can see it when, dead center in the eye of one of this nation’s strangest cultural hurricanes, he drifts through the absolute mayhem of his Picnic and somehow manages to be a rock-like source of calm and competence for (literally) thousands of the most outrageously uncalm, incompetent hustlers, freaks and assorted weirdos ever assembled under one patch of Texas sky.

It also shows when, in the middle of yet another night of pushing his ragged band through a set of half-tragic, half-boogie music and watching with a smile as his audience stumbles and whoops its way towards unconsciousness, it comes down to just him and his Spanish-style, gut-string amplified Martin, and for a while the most carefully emotional, beautifully balanced little collection of mood notes in the world go soaring through the rancid air.

This is the musical legacy of Django Reinhardt, Grady Martin and the other psychological gypsy guitar pickers from whom Willie developed his style; it is also the mark of a man who has really seen it all and can still look it straight in the eye.

Atlanta, Georgia: Willie is on a First Class trip. Laid out in the back of the limousine behind his big spade shades, he is relaxing into the ways of being a star with records on the charts. There’ll be no more no-money dives to play, and for a while there won’t even be any songwriting unless the fancy takes him. Willie explains that he’s not one of those poeple who get headaches when they’re not writing, and since his next two albums — a Gospel album and an album of Lefty Frizzel songs — are already in the can, all he really has to do is keep on showing up for Willie Nelson concerts.

There are also some interesting projects in the wind, and they might even get done. there’s the issue of a Red Headed Stranger movie, for instance (”If I had the money and any idea about how to do it, I’d be somewhere doin’ it right now”,) and the almost equally interesting notion of Willie, Ray Price, Roger Miller, Johnny Paycheck and Johnny Bush getting together to do a couple of original Cherokee Cowboy dates.

Tonight Willie’s nose will be back on the grindstone as once again he takes the stage with his gypsies and plays for the sticky young drunks and dopers of Atlanta. Tonight, once again, he’ll be up there doing “Will The Circle Be Unbroken?” and “Eileen Goodnight” with whoever wants to join in (this time it’s Tracy Nelson and Linda Ronstadt and Mylon LeFevre), and tonight there’ll be another endless hillbilly amnesia session up in the hotel room.

Tomorrow there’ll be another bloody mary morning when Paul, bless him, has paid the bills and checked us all out and onto the road again. But now, just for a while, Willie is thinking about his Gospel album and remembering that he was asked to quit teaching in Sunday School when they found out that Little Willie played the local Texas beer joints at night.

“Were you a good preacher, Willie?” I ask.

“Yes,” he says. “I really was.”

“Are you a religious man?”

“Yes,” he says, “Probably more than I ever was. Y’know?”

Somehow, when you really get serious about Willie Nelson, the answer is not at all surprising.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2021 at 6:50 p

“We celebrate 4/20 on 1/5”

Thursday, January 5th, 2023

Willie Nelson to Receive 2021 Clio Cannabis Lifetime Achievement Award

Monday, November 22nd, 2021

www.billboard.com
by: Paul Grein

Long before cannabis gained mainstream acceptance, Nelson made the case that its dangers were greatly exaggerated and its benefits were scarcely mentioned. And to look at a productive and prolific artist like Nelson, 88, it’s hard to argue.

Willie Nelson has rightly received many lifetime achievement awards, including one from the Recording Academy in 1999, another from the Country Music Association in 2012 (which named the award in his honor), induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1993, a Kennedy Center Honor in 1998 and the Library of Congress’ Gershwin Prize in 2015.

What could ever equal those prestigious honors? To a longtime marijuana advocate like Nelson, this may just do it: On Dec. 7, he will receive the 2021 Clio Cannabis Lifetime Achievement Award.

Nelson has occasionally recorded songs about his fondness for cannabis. He teamed with Snoop DoggKris Kristofferson and Jamey Johnson on “Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die” (2012) and with Merle Haggard on “It’s All Going to Pot” in 2015. The latter reached No. 48 on Hot Country Songs.

According to a statement, “Nelson was selected to receive the award for his decades-long reputation for advocating the plant’s healing powers, elevating cannabis in the mainstream and innovating in the business space. His team is responsible for introducing marijuana and hemp-based wellness products like Willie’s Reserve and Willie’s Remedy in addition to launching a new cannabis conference called Luck Summit: Planting the Seed.”

Additional honorees include Fab 5 Freddy, Mary Pryor and Ophelia Chong. The trophies will be presented as part of the 2021 Clio Cannabis Awards, streaming on Social Club TV beginning Dec. 7.

Read article here.

Willie on Weed (High Times, October 2005)

Sunday, July 4th, 2021

Willie on Weed
High Times Magazine
October 2005
by Richard Cusick

When it comes to grass, Willie’s fans divide into three distinct camps:  stoners like myself who view Willie Nelson as a sterling example of humanity; politically conservative country folks who dislike the pot thing but cry in their beers whenever he sings “Crazy”; and finally, fans who don’t smoke and don’t care, but remain mildly amused by Shotgun Willie’s outlaw ways.  So, unlike most marijuana activists, Nelson doesn’t preach merely to the converted.  Arguably, on the strength of his art and his living example, he’s helped change more minds about marijuana than any other American.

“They’re watching me,” Nelson acknowledges.  “I’m like the canary in the coal mine.  As long as I can remember the words to my songs and do a good show, they say:  “Well, it may not be affecting them so much.”

And so, despite incessant interview request, HIGH TIMES has always been treated like a red-headed stranger by the managers, press agents, record companies, road managers and assorted family members who get paid to look out for Willie Nelson’s best interests.  Frankly, I don’t think the man himself gave a shit one way or the other.  We were all waiting for the right moment to make it happen.  The release of Willie’s long-delayed reggae CD, Countryman, turned out to be the right moment.  One look at the cover art proved that.  There are actually two covers:  “One for Wal-Mart,” Willie noted, and one for every fan of the singer’s favorite plant — with a big pot leaf commanding the center.

It’s the hottest day of the year.  The temperature on the field of Prince Geroge’s Stadium in Bowie, MD, reaches triple digits, but the Bob Dylan – Willie Nelson show has attracted a particular rugged type of music fan willing to roast for hours in the sun to secure a good seat on the general admission lawn.  I’m scheduled to meet with the American music legend for an hour and a half, but a family member’s illness delays Willie by nearly an hour.  How to stuff 30 years worth of interview into 30 minutes?  My strategy involves breaking the ice by bringing the musician’s old friend Keith Stroup, founder of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, and Allen St. Pierre, NORML’s executive director, along for the ride.  Willie has been a member of NORML’s advisory board for 22 years, and so I assumed their reputations would precede me…

The familiar sound of his guitar floats softly from a state-of-the-art sound system shelved above our heads on board one of the world’s most widely travelled and legendary tour buses.  A copy of Bob Dylan’s autobiography sits on the soft brown-leather couch in the front, while Willie holds court from a corner booth.  We will talk for the next 40 minutes without interruption — save for one very unusualy exception.

HT:  You’ve done reggae songs before, but Countryman is your first full-blown reggae album.  How did that happen?

WN:  Ten years ago, I went to see Chris Blackwell when he was the head of Island Records in Jamaica, and we talked about putting out a reggae album, Chris loved the idea, but I also played him a CD I produced called Spirit, and he said, “I love Spirit.  Let’s put that out now and y’all go finish the reggae and then we’ll put it out.”

But they had a shakeup, and he left the label.  So for 10 years it kinda laid there, until the good folks after at Lost Highway picked it up and ran with it.

Keith Stroup:  Does the title Countryman refer to the ganja growers up in the mountians?

WN:  Yeah.  That’s right.

HT:  I’ve always thought reggae and country gospel are very similar, not in sound so much as in spirit.

WN:  The way the musicians tell me, reggae took off – Peter Tosh, Toots and those guys — was that reggae came basically from country music, from listening to the radio in the United States and hearing WSM play ’em some Grand Old Opry.  When they told me that, I started thinking about how country songs just naturally lend themselves to a reggae rhythm.

HT:  Does marijuana help your songwriting?

WN:  I wrote most of my good songs before I ever heard of marijuana or used it, and I’m not sure that it doesn’t slow down your writing.

HT:  Really?

WN:  Well, if you’re hungry or on edge and you’re writing, you could always just sit down and smoke a little joint and not worry about it.  But some things you need to worry about.

HT:  So taking that edge off sometimes isn’t a good thing.

WN:  Yeah.  You need that age.

(Bob Dylan quielty enters the front of the bus — Yes, really.)

WN:  Hey! Bob! (rising from booth)  C’mere.  (A brief hug and Willie returns to the corner booth.)Â

Bob Dylan:  They gotcha trapped.

HT:  We got him now.

BD:  I’ll come back.

WN:  All right.

(exit Bob Dylan)

HT:  You know, I named my daughter after than man!

WN:  You did?

HT:  We figured the name works for either a boy or a girl.

WN:  Yeah, that’s true.  Well, he’s a good guy.  Believe it or not, that’s the first time I’ve seen him this tour.  We’ve been out two weeks.  He was gonna play some chess.  He asked me if I want to play some chess, so we can do it tomorrow or the next day.

HT:  I believe we were talking about songwriting.

WN:  I started writing songs a long time before I started smoking.  Well, I started smoking cigarettes when I was 4.  I started smoking something when I was 4.  Cedar bark, Grapevines, Cotton leaves, Coffee leaves.  I even tried Black Drop one time.

HT:  Black Drop?

WN:  It was an old laxative in powder form.  Cedar bark, I smoked that.  And then I used to raise hens, so I would trade a dozen eggs for a pack of cigarettes back in those days.  About 18 cents, I think.  About 18 or 20 cents for a pack of cigarettes.  Lucky Strikes.  Camels.

HT:  In your autobiography, you said that marijuana got you off cigarettes and drinking.

WN:  Yeah.  I knew I was killing myself with cigarettes, and I knew I was really putting myself in danger with drinking so much, so somewhere along the way I decided.  “Wait a minute!  You know, do what you can do.”  In the early years, I drank all the time.  Mainly before pot.  Up until then, I was into whiskey and uppers.  You know, that’s the deal.  Truck drivers had the bennies when they made those LA turnaounds, and all that stuff was going around.  All the guitar players had it.

HT:  Fred Lockwood.  He was the first guy to ever turn you on to pot?

WN:  Yeah. A Fort Worth musician.  That’s right.

HT:  Fred Lockwood was not only the first person to give you a joint, as I understand it, he’s always the guy who gave you the line.  “I Gotta Get Drunk and I Sure do Regret It.”

WN:  There was two.  There was Fred Lockwood and there was Ace Lockwood.  They were brothers.  Fred was the one who gave me the line, “I Gotta Get Drunk and I sure Do Regret It” and his brother Ace went and gave me a itty bitty little snuff can full of pot one time.

HT:  So that was your first ime around the block?

WN:  I played a club there, and we played together.  These guys were musicians, so we went over to their house, and Fred and I were playing dominoes.  That was the first time I ever smoked it.  I think I smoked it about six months before I ever got high.  And then, all of a sudden:  “Oh yeah –that’s what that is.”

HT:  Willie, you’re a musician known for making political stands.  Not every musician does that.

WN:  I’ve let my beliefs be known and they turned out to be political.  I didn’t start out taking any political stands — just taking stands.

HT:  You just think a certain way and…

KS…groups like NORML start using you politically.

HT:  You’ve also been out front about your use of cannabis for a long time.  Have you taken a lot of flak for it over your career.

WN:  Zero that I know of.

HT:  It’s amazing how you get buy.

WN:  Well, I got busted.

HT:  750,000 people got busted for marijuana last year.

KS:  Yeah, but none of them got busted because they slept on the side of the highway and then raised the “hand-rolled cigarette defense.” Which I don’t believe has worked for anybody else — wasn’t that it?

WN:  You can’t assume that a rolled-up cigarette in an ashtray, looking through the window, is a marijuana cigarette.

KS:  In Texas, in particular!  I think of that as the Willie Nelson Defense.

WN:  I thought it was brilliant.

KS:  I did, too.

HT:  I hope you don’t mind my blazing, but I’m about to see Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan play.

WN:  You’ve gotta get there.

HT:  Well, I know you recommend moderation.

WN:  Moderation is always the key, even for pot.  You can over-do pot.  And it’s not for the kids… After they get 18, 21 years old, they’re going to try whatever they’re gonna try…

HT:  What’s the difference smoking pot 50 years ago and now?

WN:  It costs more money.

HT:  People say it’s better now, but I don’t remember not getting high 25 years ago.

WN:  No, I don’t either.  You know, it’s kind of like sex — there’s none bad, but there’s just some that’s better.  I think our tolerance is pretty good, too.

HT:  I ususlaly stop for a month every year or so.

KS:  I usualy stop for a few days every now and then — because I run out.

WN:  I intentionally let myself run out every now and then.

KS:  A couple of days into that, I usually say, “Let me rethink that decision.”

WN:  Either that or one of the guys’ll bring me one and say, “Here, don’t you think it’s time?

Willie’s Reserve

Saturday, July 3rd, 2021

Willie quashes rumors

Monday, June 7th, 2021

“I’m not smoking anymore, but I’m not smoking any less either.” — Willie Nelson

Saturday, December 7th, 2019

Willie Nelson’s cannabis conference

Sunday, May 2nd, 2021

www.austin360.com
by: Deborah Sengupta Stith

On Willie Nelson’s 88th birthday and the final day of his inaugural cannabis conference, the Texas Senate began work on a House-passed bill allowing holstered handguns to be carried in public without a state-issued permit.  

The country music legend reflected on the development with wry humor during his keynote interview on April 29.

“I just saw where in Texas now, it’s going to be legal to carry a gun around openly. I said, ‘Well, at least now let us light up a joint so we won’t be armed and dangerous,’” Nelson quipped. 

Nelson’s remarks during Luck Summit: Planting the Seed came at the end of a virtual birthday bash that recapped highlights from three days of panels, musical performances, sketch comedy and more. The closing event was an even mix of entertainment and call-to-action.

read article here

Luck Summit

Monday, April 26th, 2021

Willie Nelson’s Team Luck works to make 4/20 National Holiday

Friday, April 23rd, 2021
Willie Nelson organization petitions Biden to make April 20 a national holiday

© Getty Images

www.TheHill.com

Country music legend Willie Nelson’s organization, Luck Reunion, has started a petition for President Biden to make April 20 through April 29 a national holiday for marijuana.

“The fine people of Luck, Texas, and supporters of the great Willie Nelson, on behalf of cannabis users around the nation, are writing today to ask you to consider declaring the 9 days spanning April 20 to April 29 an official national holiday: the ‘High Holidays,’” the petition states

The petition was started by Luck Reunion and has over 2,200 signatures. The goal is to get 2,500 signatures. 

The holiday would end on April 29 in honor of Nelson’s birthday.

The real purpose, the group says, of the request is to educate people about marijuana and attempt to de-stigmatize it.

“We believe that recognition of the ‘High Holidays’ opens the door to much needed dialogue supporting the many benefits of cannabis while helping to remove the unjustified stigmas currently surrounding this amazing plant,” the petition says.

The petition comes before Luck Reunion hosts their first annual cannabis convention called “Planting the Seed.”

“Please puff, puff, and pass this to your friends in Congress for consideration,” the petition says.

Nelson has been an advocate for marijuana and education around the topic for much of his musical career.

Line up announced for Luck’s Marijuana Summit (4/26 – 4/29, 2021)

Wednesday, April 21st, 2021

www.Luck

Luck Presents is proud to announce the lineup for their first annual cannabis convention, Luck Summit: Planting the Seed, which benefits HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project.

Presented by Rocket Seeds and hosted by Nathaniel Rateliff, the multi-day virtual summit seeks to destigmatize, educate, and promote cannabis culture in an informative and entertaining way. During the summit, which runs virtually April 26-29, Luck and fellow cannabis-advocate partners will showcase the cannabis plant through the lenses of history, science, entertainment, and culture. 

Matt Bizer, co-founder of Luck Presents, says of the programming, “It was important to us in this first year event that we created a bi-partisan, stigma free conversation around cannabis in its many forms. We truly believe that Willie has been a unifier for so many in his years as both a cannabis activist and humanitarian. With Willie as our landlord we are able to set a stage and a platform for this conversation in a unique way here in Texas and throughout the country.” 

Today, team Luck unveiled a highly curated lineup that is both entertainingly enlightening and recreationally educational, a sample of which is listed below. 

To register or view the full summit schedule, please click here

Planting the Seed will feature something for everyone—from the cannabis curious to the long-time 420-friendly—on all aspects of the cannabis plant: economics, logistics, agriculture, legalities, legislative approaches, culture, and revenue streams.

A sample of panel topics and speakers is listed below:
Texas State Agricultural Commissioner Sid Miller on Hemp for Texas, a conversation with Lisa Pittman (Zuber Lawler, LLP) and Sid Miller (Commissioner).

Beto O’Rouke: An Argument for Ending the Prohibition of Marijuana, a discussion with former Congressman O’Rouke and Shawn Hauser (Partner, Vicente Sederberg LLP).

Diversity & Equity in the Cannabis Culture.A fact-based national panel of experts discussing the real numbers of representation in cannabis. This panel will dive into how diverse representation—or lack thereof—impacts the emerging cannabis market. 
Moderator: Gaynell Rogers (Treehouse Global Ventures)Panelists: Opehlia Chong (Consultant), Dr. Janice M Vaghn Knox, Khadijah Adams (Girl Get That Money) 

Cannabinoids 101: Delta 9 THC vs CBD. What’s a cannabinoid and will it get me high?Whether you’re a lifelong fan of cannabis or you’re just dipping your toe into the CBD craze, in this discussion we’ll dive into what actually is a cannabinoid (there are over 160 of them!) and how these different cannabinoids can work in YOUR BODY. From the more popular Delta 9 THC and CBD cannabinoids to newer cannabinoids like Delta 8 THC and CBG, our expert panel is here to touch on all of them, and leave you with a better understanding of how and what to consume to best help your specific needs. Knowledge is power, and cannabis is powerful, so knowing what cannabinoids do will help guide you towards the best experience with this plant.

Moderator: Shayda Torabi (RESTART CBD)Panelists: Franny Tacy (Franny’s Farmacy), Jocelyn Sheltraw (headset.io), Leah Lakstins (Higher Ed Hemp Tours) 

Indica, Sativa, Hybrid: Terpenes: How to control your effects.

Whether you’re a lifelong fan of cannabis or you’re just dipping your toe into the CBD craze, in this discussion we’ll dive into what actually is a cannabinoid (there are over 160 of them!) and how these different cannabinoids can work in YOUR BODY. From the more popular Delta 9 THC and CBD cannabinoids to newer cannabinoids like Delta 8 THC and CBG, our expert panel is here to touch on all of them, and leave you with a better understanding of how and what to consume to best help your specific needs. Knowledge is power, and cannabis is powerful, so knowing what cannabinoids do will help guide you towards the best experience with this plant.

Moderator: Shayda Torabi (RESTART CBD)Panelists: Andrew Marlatt (Pharmlabs Texas), Rachelle Gordon (Cannabis writer), Anita Sommers (M(ASCP), CBD Genie, Cannabis Science Communicator)

Where’s The Money? Access to Capital, Opportunities for Investment.

An experienced panel of fund managers and active investors discuss opportunities, resources and reality checks. For entrepreneurs and investors, this panel promises to provide helpful insights for navigating the newly established legal cannabis financial market. 
Moderator: Gaynell Rogers (Treehouse Global Ventures)Panelists: Joyce Cenali (Big Rock Partners), Al Foreman (Tuatara)

How Hemp Helps Around the Farm: Hemp, Animals & Agriculture.The Nelsons have long rallied support for the American family farmer. No Luck Summit would be complete without a conversation around hemp and its benefits for animals and agricultural practices. We’ll explore the history of hemp usage as animal feed and soil replenishment while diving into the ways hemp is being reintegrated into modern day agriculture practices.
Moderator: Hunter Buffinton (Hemp Feed Coalition) Panelists: Dan Hunter (Assistant Commissioner, TX Dept. of Agriculture), Dr. Clair Thunes, Vanessa Snyder (Eurofins Hemp & Botanics), Morgan Ellioit (IND HEMP)

Musical performances by Early James, Devon Gilfilian, Marcus King, Jonathan Tyler, Aaron Lee Tasjan, The Nude Party, and more. 

To register or view the full summit schedule, please click here. To read Variety’s take on the lineup and summit, please click here

Additionally, team Luck has partnered with the much-loved podcast, Great Moments in Weed History. The episodes released in partnership with Planting the Seed will dive deep into humanity’s 10,000+ year relationship with cannabis to find the humor, heart, and historical importance of this very special plant. As part of the Luck Summit, hosts Abdullah Saeed and David Bienenstock proudly present five short films tracing Willie Nelson’s sixty-year love affair with cannabis—from his first toke in Fort Worth, Texas in 1954 to the creation of his very own cannabis company. The first episode, “Willie and Weed: The Origin Story,” is available now, and features Ethan Hawke and Charlie Sexton. 

Click here to watch. 
A special thanks to our sponsors: Rocket Seeds, Koan, Willie’s Reserve, GRAV, Greenbelt Botanicals, Gibson, Clay Imports, Dad Grass and Weed, and Whiskey News.
Sign up:Planting the Seed is a donation-based ticketed event raising money for HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project, an organization that informs, registers and turns out voters who are interested in cannabis policy. To register or for more information on the High Holidays as a whole, please click here

Join the Luck Seed Summit Cannabis Convention, presented by Willie Nelson and Luck (4/26 – 4/29)

Wednesday, April 7th, 2021

Willie Nelson and Luck Presents announce first annual cannabis convention, Luck Summit: Planting the Seed, benefiting HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project.

The Virtual programming begins on 4/26 and will air through Willie Nelson’s birthday on 4/29

“I think people need to be educated to the fact that marijuana is not a drug. Marijuana is an herb and a flower. God put it here. If He put it here and He wants it to grow, what gives the government the right to say that God is wrong?”-Willie Nelson

Hosted by Nathanial Rateliff, the multi-day virtual summit seeks to destigmatize, educate, and promote cannabis culture in an informative and entertaining way. During the summit, Luck and fellow cannabis-advocate partners will showcase the cannabis plant through its many lenses including history, science, entertainment, and culture. In addition to panel discussions and keynote speakers, attendees will be treated to musical collaborations, comedy sketches, cooking demonstrations, health-focused activities, and more. 

Additionally, team Luck is pleased to announce a partnership with the good folks at HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project, an organization that informs, registers and turns out voters who are interested in cannabis policy. “Willie Nelson is a music and cannabis icon, so of course we’re thrilled to partner,” says Sam D’Arcangelo, Director of HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project.

“Texas and the rest of the United States are sitting at a cannabis crossroads right now. There’s no better time to celebrate how far we’ve come and have a conversation about where cannabis legalization goes from here.” All ticket proceeds from the summit will be donated to the Voter Project to aid in their efforts. 

Who is Planting the Seed for? The summit will hold space for honest, stripped down dialogue between industry veterans, casual connoisseurs, activists, artists, and everyone in between. Have something to say or questions about the benefits and opportunities surrounding hemp and cannabis as a commodity, and as medicine? This summit is for you.

What’s on the discussion docket? Civil discourse, building community, legalization through policy amendments, science, de-stigmatization, hemp and cannabis as commodity products and cash crops, taxation that aids the economy, decriminalization and pathways toward freeing non-violent offenders for cannabis convictions, de-stigmatizing cannabis in industries weary of engaging, cannabis history and prohibition, and so much more. 
The mission of the Luck Summit is to create a community discussion around destigmatizing, decriminalizing, and legalizing hemp and cannabis in the state of Texas and beyond. 

Sign up: Planting the Seed is a donation-based ticketed summit raising money for HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project. To register or for more information on the High Holidays, please visit high.holiday
Planting the Seed is the marque event of Luck’s “High Holidays,” a 9 day celebration of the cannabis plant and its many benefits which begins on 4/20 and ends on Willie’s birthday, 4/29.

Additionally, Luck Presents is petitioning the Biden Administration and Congress to make 4/20 to 4/29 the “High Holidays” in honor of the cannabis industry, and to celebrate Willie’s birthday.

Sign the petition here

Visit high.holiday for more information. 
Luck Presents is a rogue cultural collective headquartered in Willie Nelson’s Luck, TX. Anchored by its flagship event, the annual Luck Reunion, Luck Presents creates experiences that embrace our past while cultivating new traditions in American roots culture. 

HeadCount’s Cannabis Voter Project informs, registers, and turns out voters who want to see cannabis policy move forward. We believe cannabis reform is a unique issue with the power to turn large numbers of people into active participants in our democracy.

Wednesday, April 7th, 2021

Willie’s Reserve Now Available in Arizona

Tuesday, February 9th, 2021

www.MarijuanaTimes
by: Ashley Oakes Scott

Willie Nelson, an award-winning musician and activist has partnered with Hana Meds to bring his legendary stash of cannabis pre-rolls, Willie’s Reserve, to Arizona. Willie Nelson has been a true supporter of the cannabis industry, speaking up about the benefits through responsible and regulated cultivation and sale. 

The three products from Willie’s Reserve that are now available in the Arizona market are sativa-dominant Golden Goat, hybrid Headband, and indica-dominant Bubba Kush. The three strains come in “High Five Packs” and will contain five whole-flower, no-trim, half-gram pre-rolls in a collectible branded tin. 

In order to bring the brand to another state due to federal regulations, Willie’s Reserve sought one of the best vertically integrated cannabis companies, Hana Meds, to partner with. Hana Meds brought the first pre-roll brand to the legalized Arizona cannabis market, Dutchie. Dutchie is known for its classic vibe but plethora of unique, potent, and consistent strains.

Read article here. 

“I don’t smoke weed to get high,” — Willie Nelson

Saturday, December 5th, 2020

“I channeled my Willie Nelson”

Thursday, November 19th, 2020

Rob The Original

” I Drank some @rebelcoastwinery and channeled my inner Willie Nelson today.”