A Willie Nelson conversation can also go in any number of directions. When Radio.com sat down with Nelson for a chat on his bus last month, the conversation started on topic with his latest album Band of Brothers. Soon, though, it moved into text messaging, concept albums, the enduring influence of the Grand Ole Opry, old friends of his like Billy Joe Shaver and Chet Atkins, and why he loves performing and touring so much (six decades down the road and "it's still fun"). It's a meandering path, but it's a hell of a fun journey - and we wouldn't want it any other way.

Two key building blocks of Nelson's long career came up repeatedly: songwriting and performing. The latter has always been at the heart of Nelson's musical world. Even now performing is his chief occupation; he spends more nights on his tour bus than he does at his ranch in Texas.

As for songwriting, that's what jump-started his commercial career, thanks to songs he wrote like "Crazy," "Family Bible" and "Night Life." By his own estimation Nelson has written thousands, and this year he added even more to the roster. His latest album Band of Brothers, released this past June, includes nine newly written compositions that have no problem standing on their own as part of Nelson's extensive catalog.

"It's been a while since I wrote that much," Nelson told Radio.com. We were speaking on his bus before a July 12 show with his band, the Family, at Ravinia, a lovely outdoor amphitheater just north of Chicago.

Curiously, Band of Brothers is the first Nelson album to focus on newly written material since his 1996 album Spirit. What took him so long? "Oh, I don't know," Nelson said. "Roger Miller said it pretty good, he said, 'Sometimes the well runs dry. And you've got to wait till you live a while to let it fill up again.' And I think there's a lot of truth in that."

When pressed, Nelson admitted that it wasn't just surge of personal inspiration that got him writing again. He had some outside motivation. "The secret ingredient here is Buddy Cannon," Nelson said. "He and I work well together. And it's rare I find anyone I can really feel comfortable writing with. But he and I kinda hit a stride there and wrote some pretty good songs."

Cannon is a veteran Nashville songwriter and producer best known for his work with Kenny Chesney (he's produced the bulk of Chesney's albums, including his upcoming collection The Big Revival). All nine of the Nelson-penned songs on Band of Brothers were cowritten with Cannon.

That, however, doesn't mean Nelson and Cannon sat down in a room together to hash things out, as is typical among many Nashville songwriters. Instead, they wrote songs by passing ideas back and forth via text messages.

"It just happened to be the easiest way to do it," Nelson said. "I'll write a verse, he'll write a verse. One of us will put a melody down. And he's got all those great musicians there in Nashville and he can cut the track. And next thing you know we've got an album."

Nelson said he's never written that way before, but he emphasized that "it's a lot easier. You're free to think or say or write what you want to. And Buddy does the same thing. He's got great instincts, and we seem to be fairly successful together."

Band of Brothers isn't the first time Cannon and Nelson have collaborated. "I had him do some producing for me on a couple albums I did," including recent releases Moment of Forever, Heroes and Let's Face the Music and Dance. "We just became good friends and started having a good time writing and making records."