If you’ve lived in Nashville long, you’ve probably felt you shared something with John Prine, who died of complications from COVID in April 2020 and is survived by family, friends and a seemingly bottomless trove of witty, insightful, compassionate songs. There have been many heartfelt tributes to his influence, both since his passing and well before (note the second volume of Broken Hearts and Dirty Windows, a collection released by Oh Boy, the indie label Prine co-founded in 1981). But don’t sleep on Kiss My Ass Goodbye, a dizzying double-LP trip through the Prine songbook released by local label Devil’s Tower Records in conjunction with Groove Family Records. On the 20-song tribute, standards like “Angel From Montgomery” and relative obscurities like “Down by the Side of the Road” receive equal representation from players like Jeff Mix and the Songhearts, Mick Mullin, Chris Crofton and Heaven Honey, whose eclectic reworkings of the material testify to its universality and timelessness.
Best Tribute Album
