Personnel includes: Townes Van Zandt, Calvin Russell, Willie Nelson.

Producers include: Kevin Eggers, Jack Clement, Jim Malloy, Ronald Frangipane, Wolfgang Doebeling.

Includes liner notes by John Kruth.

One of the most respected singer/songwriters of his era, Texan troubadour TOWNES VAN ZANDT was truly a "songwriter's songwriter." With deceptive subtlety he merged the lonesome country sound and accessible song structures of Hank Williams with the complex, poetic imagery of Bob Dylan, all filtered through Townes's own unique, quirky sensibility. BEST OF TOWNES VAN ZANDT provides an excellent introduction into the artist's formidable catalog. Alternately delicate and romantic ("If I Needed You") and engulfed in existential angst ("Snake Mountain Blues"), Van Zandt could move from simple-but-eloquent observations to dizzying, inscrutable surrealism at the drop of a ten-gallon hat, and this solid compilation is a perfect tool for navigating that highly rewarding artistic expanse.