Scanning this entertaining thread, I note a couple of names -- Leo Kottke and Townes Van Zandt -- whom I encountered separately and long ago at gigs in Chicago. They both struck me as approachable and friendly, devoid of attitude. When I knew him in his early days before he was famous outside the local folk scene, Steve Goodman was, er, a good man.

On the other hand, you might look up Andrew Calhoun's "Going Down to See John Prine" and pray that nobody ever writes a song like that about you.