Willie Nelson is cool.

He's a tax-evading, pot smoking, gay rights loving cowboy.

Awesome.

Dallas Morning News | News for Dallas, Texas | Entertainment Columnist Mario Tarradell:

"Willie Nelson's crooned cowboy songs before, from the signature 'Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys' to 'My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys.'

But never like this: On 'Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other,' the Texas country icon sings about love among men on the range. Available exclusively at iTunes today, the song aims to show Mr. Nelson's support for gays, particularly to conservative country-music fans.

'The song's been in the closet for 20 years,' Mr. Nelson said in a prepared statement. It was written in 1981 by Lubbock-born singer-songwriter Ned Sublette.

'The timing's right for it to come out. I'm just opening the door.'

Mr. Nelson recorded a song for the Brokeback Mountain soundtrack, the melancholy ballad 'He Was a Friend of Mine.' And the movie about two cowboys in love may have provided the perfect opportunity to release this new song. But Mr. Nelson also has a personal connection to the tune.

Two years ago, David Anderson, Mr. Nelson's friend and tour manager of three decades, told his boss he's gay. Last March, while Mr. Nelson recorded a batch of previously unreleased songs for iTunes, he discovered the song in a stack of demos he had tossed into a drawer.

Singing 'Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other' was Mr. Nelson's way of telling a longtime pal everything was OK, says Mr. Anderson."