Full of deep empathy, sober insights, and lively guitar licks, Rodney Crowell's new album takes it's title from a seemingly mundane stretch of four-lane blacktop that runs deep into Louisiana. It's the road he and producer Tyler Bryant drove to reach the remote studio where they recorded these songs, hauling a truckload of gear on a two-day journey that ended in swamps. Along the way Crowell looked up the route they were driving: Airline Highway. It's the southernmost segment of Highway 61, also called the Blues Highway or the Great River Road, and it follows the Mississippi River from Minnesota down to New Orleans. "At a basic level there are a lot more years behind me than there are ahead of me. Now it's just about the work and what a blessing it is to be able to do it. The work truly feeds me in the moment."