Jeff Bridges is releasing a solo album

Jeff Bridges' Oscar-winning turn as fictionalized country musician "Bad" Blake was the bright spot in 2009's otherwise shitty Oscar season. Now, he's taking the next step and releasing an album in real life, due out this summer on EMI's Blue Note. The Dude will be working with T Bone Burnett on the album, which set to feature a mix of covers (including perennial celebrity-cover choice Tom Waits) and some originals.

Burnett has had his hands in a whole mess of old-timey projects — you may remember him as the man responsible for making folk music briefly popular again with O Brother, Where Art Thou? and further inflating Joaquin Phoenix's ego by making him sound pretty decent as Johnny Cash in Walk the Line. Burnett's contribution to Crazy Heart, "The Weary Kind," co-written with Ryan Bingham, won him both an Oscar and Grammy.

Bridges has been a musician for most of his life — he met Burnett on the set of Heaven's Gate through Kris Kristofferson, and has already released an album (Be Here Soon) with Michael McDonald, of "Yah Mo B There" fame.

The album is set to feature guest slots from the likes of Roseanne Cash and Sam Phillips. I bet it's going to be worth checking out, like everything Jeff Bridges does.