It was a ghost town of three people. So how did Luckenbach rival Nashville as the heartland of country music?

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 – and became a symbol of a simpler American life In the summer of 1973, the US country singer Jerry Jeff Walker was in the…