George Strait - Cowboys and Dreamers [2LP]

Country's steadiest hand is still in fine voice on George Strait's Cowboys and Dreamers, pressed here as a two-LP set.

Released in 2024, it is Strait's thirty-first studio album, and once again he co-produced with Chuck Ainlay, the partnership behind Honky Tonk Time Machine, with Tony Brown also lending a hand on several tracks. The record carries a heavy heart beneath the easy swing: Strait dedicated it to longtime Ace in the Hole Band fiddler Gene Elders, manager Erv Woosley and road manager Tom Foote, all of whom died that year.

The sound is neotraditional country through and through, with honky-tonk shuffles and a dash of Western swing. Three Drinks Behind opens the album in classic barroom territory, and MIA Down in MIA has fun with its wordplay title. Honky Tonk Hall of Fame pairs Strait with Chris Stapleton, two of the genre's great voices trading lines, while Waymore's Blues revisits a song Waylon Jennings co-wrote and recorded in 1975.

Strait's baritone remains warm, unhurried and remarkably unchanged by the years.

Decades into a career that has set the standard for traditional country, Cowboys and Dreamers shows a legend still choosing great songs and singing them like he means every word, just as he always has.