In this 2003 session, Haggard and his guitar (gifted to him by Randy Travis) join David Dye in the World Cafe studio. Haggard reminisces about his childhood and about playing gigs all over Bakersfield, Calif., where he was born: he says he performed “bar room music” by day and rock ‘n’ roll in the clubs at night. The music coming out of his hometown at the time challenged a musician so much more, he says, than did the music of Nashville. In another interview highlight, Haggard talks about his belief that politicians need to stop dancing around real problems and just come out with the truth — a feeling that still resonates for so many Americans.

Join us in remembering the great Merle Haggard. Listen back to the complete 30-minute interview in the player above.

Copyright 2016 WXPN-FM. To see more, visit WXPN-FM.

Luckily, music still has a few old uncles, chief among them Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard. The country titans share a long history. Its landmark was the 1983 album Pancho & Lefty, which set the standard for top artists collaborating with and beyond their home genre. Nelson and Haggard could have stopped there, but they’ve continued to work together on numerous recordings and tours, including the recent cross-country jaunt that anticipated this new release. I caught one of their shows in 2013 and was dazzled by the intact artistry of these two men, one on either side of 80; their laid-back, wide-ranging sets touched upon jazz and R&B as well as country and showed their authority as virtuoso raconteurs and masters of the most advanced level of IDGAF.

They bring that utter assurance into Django And Jimmie, Nelson’s sixth studio release for the Legacy label since 2012. (He’s rivaling Betty White for the title of hardest-working senior in show business.) The title track connects it with the inimitable Pancho & Lefty by celebrating a pair of musical iconoclasts: the guitarist Django Reinhardt and Jimmie Rodgers, the singing brakeman whose stardom defined early country music. The song puts eclecticism upfront as a value, and the rest of the album fulfills that mandate. There’s plenty of humor in songs like the smoke-out anthem “It’s All Gone To Pot” and the shaggy-god reminiscence “Missing Ol’ Johnny Cash,” which also features the great Bobby Bare. There are tender odes like the Beatles-esque “Where Dreams Come To Die,” co-written by Nelson and album producer Buddy Cannon. And there’s some lightning-sparked Bakersfield spirit in a 50th-anniversary rendition of Haggard’s signature song “Swinging Doors.”

There’s so much affection running between these two lifelong compatriots and the seasoned musicians who share their space in the studio that nearly any track on Django And Jimmie will likely lift the spirits of even the gloomiest listener. Nelson and Haggard cover each other’s classics, rib each other about the girls they’ve loved before, and wrap it all up with the gentle mutual-admiration fest “The Only Man Wilder Than Me.” In a promotional video for that song, someone asks if the buddies wrote that song. “Merle did,” Nelson says. “I told him to.” And they laugh, knowing that this will be another great story to add to their old-uncle treasure chest.

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.