Linda Ronstadt - Hasten Down the Wind

On Hasten Down the Wind, Linda Ronstadt proves again that she could take any song and make it hers, a 1976 album of heartache and hard-won strength.

By the mid-seventies, Ronstadt was the leading voice of the Los Angeles country rock scene, and this seventh studio album kept her winning streak going, earning her a second Grammy for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. Producer Peter Asher surrounded her with first-rate players, including Andrew Gold, Waddy Wachtel, Dan Dugmore and Russ Kunkel, with Don Henley adding harmony vocals to the title track.

Ronstadt had a famously sharp ear for songwriters. She brings three songs from her friend Karla Bonoff, among them the pleading "Lose Again" and the devastating "Someone to Lay Down Beside Me", sung with a quiet, aching restraint. Warren Zevon's "Hasten Down the Wind" becomes a tender meditation on letting go.

She also knew how to cut loose. Her take on Buddy Holly's "That'll Be the Day" bounces with rock and roll joy, and a Willie Nelson classic made famous by Patsy Cline gets a gorgeous country treatment. Pedal steel, piano and David Campbell's string arrangements give everything a warm, burnished glow.

It is a reminder that few singers have ever sounded this powerful and this vulnerable at the same time.