In 1971, self-appointed mayor Hondo Crouch turned the Texan town into a rural respite for country stars. Soon it was immortalised in chart-topping songs \u2013 and became a symbol of a simpler American life<\/p>\n
In the summer of 1973, the US country singer Jerry Jeff Walker was in the middle of nowhere, recording his soon-to-be-classic album \u00a1Viva Terlingua!. A crowd was packed to the rafters in an old dancehall 70 miles west of Austin, in Luckenbach, Texas. An extension lead ran from the hall to a recording truck outside. After everyone had gone home that night, Walker stood in the street and said to Hondo Crouch, Luckenbach\u2019s self-appointed mayor: \u201cI wonder what we just did.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Crouch had bought the town two years prior, its population was just three people \u2013 and according to the most recent census in 2021, it\u2019s back at the same number. But in the 1970s, this ramshackle town thrived as Walker and his peers headed there, and Luckenbach became one of the most improbable yet important centres for country music.<\/p>\n
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