Alejandro Escovedo on "Half a Man"

Alejandro Escovedo is almost surely the only artist who has shared bills with both Willie Nelson and the Sex Pistols. On this episode, the singer-songwriter—who was a major figure in the West Coast punk scene of the seventies and rode herd over the Americana movement in the nineties—talks about Willie’s 1963 single “Half a Man.” It’s a song that peaked at number 25 on the country charts back then, and it makes Alejandro think of his father, ghost stories, old pot dealers, and the left-field cowpunk music video that first put him on Willie’s radar.