Willie Nelson may be America's greatest balladeer, capable of making any song sound like a standard. For all his genius, Nelson can be kind of lazy, and this disc — a sequel of sorts to his beloved 1978 standards collection, Stardust — he only occasionally sounds like he's trying. Nelson wrings pathos out of "Come Rain or Come Shine" and plays the dirty old man to perfection in "Baby, It's Cold Outside," drawling come-ons to Norah Jones. But his band pushes the music into airless cocktail-jazz territory, and Nelson often sounds glib and unengaged. Nelson can swing a tune like "Fly Me to the Moon" in his sleep — and here, alas, he does.

“1999”

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.