Kris Kristofferson Video Playlist

11:30 AM GMT 08/02/2008

KRIS KRISTOFFERSON’S WRITTEN more great songs than you could shake a big old stick at, but as a performer he’s more modest than most. It’s what makes the subject of this month’s MOJO Interview a great collaborator, able to tolerate Jerry Lee Lewis acting the goat or cede centre stage to Norah Jones. Check out our duet-heavy footage and marvel especially at his sang-froid in front of a hostile audience at the Isle Of Wight Festival, 1970...

Me And Bobby McGee (live at The Isle Of Wight, 1970)

KK turns to his band while the Isle Of White Festival descends into chaos. “I think they’re gonna shoot us,” he notes, drily. Luckily, industrial quantities of marijuana appear to have softened the blow (and slowed down the song!).

Help Me Make It Through The Night (with Rita Coolidge)

Can you handle KK nuzzling La Coolidge throughout this sex-charged 1972 version of KK’s greatest love song?

Sunday Morning Coming Down (with Johnny Cash)

Kristofferson joins Johnny Cash on the latter’s TV show to essay KK’s self-hating hangover classic. Cash looks like he knows the feeling...

Help Me Make It Through The Night (with Jerry Lee Lewis)

No embed available, but check this out...

The Killer thinks this is a comedy song, and KK laughs loyally along. The creepiest version of this tune ever minted, courtesy 1982 TV Special, 25 Years Of Jerry Lee Lewis.

Highwayman (with The Highwaymen)

KK, Cash, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings stick four fingers up at Nashville while topping the country chart in 1985 with their epic, four-handed, Jimmy Webb-penned signature song.

Introducing Sinead O’Connor at 1992’s infamous Bob Dylan Tribute

Kristofferson introduces, then comforts O’Connor at 1992’s Bob Dylan tribute concert, with the audience baying for her blood following her Pope pic desecration on Saturday Night Live two weeks earlier. A gentleman and (quite literally, of course) a scholar...

I Guess Things Happen That Way (with Norah Jones)

Kristofferson and Jones deliver the Jack Clement tune at a Johnny Cash Tribute show. Jones sceptics: check the vocal...

In The News

From last year’s excellent This Old Road set, proof of Kristofferson’s continuing political engagement. Iraq, Bush, the world today: KK lets go with both barrels.

And finally... Best Of All Possible Worlds (with Rita Coolidge & Dean Martin. Yes, Dean Martin!)

Kristofferson rewrites Voltaire’s Candide – as befits a Rhodes Scholar. But why is he cuddling Dean Martin? And will Rita Coolidge ever get that tractor in gear?

Posted by Danny_Eccleston at 11:30 AM GMT 08/02/2008