Year: 2014

There’s that old saw about a good double album being a better single album if it wasn’t for an artist’s hubris. But Lucinda Williams’ first doubleheader doesn’t fit that bill.

If anything, it’s too much of a good thing.

Williams has never been in a hurry to rush out a new release. She’s crafted her songs with never-ending patience and painstaking detail – sometimes to the point where it split her band apart, as with the long gestation of her 1998 masterpiece, Car Wheels On A Gravel Road. Thus, each new album from Williams arrives after an enduring wait, feeling like a revival or even rebirth of her career all over again.

And so the unveiling of this new double-album creation is even more surprising. Arriving three years after 2011’s Blessed, it’s been a long time coming.

The album is, simply put, a stunner. It’s packed with blues, rockers, and country tunes that are among her best. Great songwriting, great singing, and of course, great guitar playing.

Williams has always appreciated a good guitarist. In the early days, she worked with the phenomenal Gurf Morlix, who literally created her sound. Parting ways during the protracted gestation of Car Wheels, it took several guitarslingers to fill his slot in the years since: Buddy Miller, Charlie Sexton, Johnny Lee Schell, and others.

This album includes several guitar players who have stuck with Williams over the years, such as Greg Leisz and Val McCallum. The picking is so good and fits so seamlessly with Williams’ vocals that this is as much a singer-songwriter album as it is a guitar album.

She’s also joined by guests on numerous tracks, including guitarist Tony Joe White on “West Memphis” and “Something Wicked This Way Comes” as well as Jakob Dylan lending harmony vocals to “It’s Gonna Rain.” Faces keyboardist Ian “Mac” McLagan plays piano on five tracks. On several tracks she’s backed by Elvis Costello’s rhythm section of drummer Pete Thomas and bassist Davey Faragaher, who are joined by Wallflowers guitarist Stuart Mathis.

On two cuts – “It’s Gonna Rain” and J.J. Cale’s “Magnolia” – the band is joined by Bill Frisell on electric guitar, who proves an ideal fit with Williams’ brand of Americana.

Standouts include the searing “Something Wicked This Way Comes,” an eerie, haunting slice of deep roots music. “This Old Heartache” is crowned by Leisz’s majestic pedal steel guitar, with a glorious, lyrical solo.

But selecting just cuts from such a tour de force double album is silly. This ranks among Williams’ best – and will likely become a classic.

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This article originally appeared in VG‘s December ’14 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.

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In late 1994, Minneapolis’ entry in the “godfathers of alt-country” sweepstakes appeared on the ropes. The Jayhawks learned that Mark Olson, who for 10 years had split songwriting duties with lead guitarist Gary Louris, was taking his leave. Suddenly, the harmonies that had been the band’s hallmark, earning heavy comparisons to the Flying Burrito Brothers and others, were no more. The band found a way to reboot, however, and the American label has issued remastered and expanded editions of their three post-Olson studio albums.

With Louris and bassist Marc Perlman remaining as the lone original Jayhawks, Sound Of Lies (1997) had many fans losing the plot. For one thing, Louris had expanded his sonic toolbox, introducing particularly dissonant textures. He and Perlman also tapped guitarist Kraig Johnston of Minneapolis’ criminally underrated Stoogeian/Stonesy Run Westy Run and reenlisted pianist Karen Grotberg, whose gorgeous harmonies and Ian McLaglan-like contributions had marked the band’s 1995 masterstroke, Tomorrow The Green Grass. Perhaps most crucially, drummer Tim O’Reagan (ex-Joe Henry) joined after Tomorrow; as PD Larson writes in this reissue’s extensive liner notes, “Incredibly, Louris had won the ‘harmony lottery’ for a second time.”

Sound Of Lies ranges from the loud/quiet/loud “Think About It” to the slowly soaring “Trouble,” the sardonic “Big Star,” and the downer title track that closes the album. Often, Louris’ lyrics struggle to mask contempt for their subjects and evoke what were by all accounts dark times for the songwriter, personally and professionally. The result has a bleary early-hours edge not unlike Neil Young’s On The Beach.

If Sound befuddled fans, Smile (2000) was a further step away from the band’s roots. The choice of producer, Bob Ezrin (Kiss, Alice Cooper, et al), fueled confusion, but if the result leans toward an FM-ready sheen, it also works as a logical extension of its predecessor, presenting monster hooks that Sound, for all its dark charm, perhaps aspired to but never quite achieved.

With Grotberg and Johnston gone, the band recruited ex-Long Ryder Stephen McCarthy for Rainy Day Music (2003), a much welcomed return to form. Highlights include “Tailspin” (with Bernie Leadon on banjo) and the Matthew Sweet cowrite, “Stumbling Through The Dark.” O’Reagan offers a stellar contribution in “Tampa To Tulsa.”

Still largely defined by their pioneering work in the “No Depression” subgenre, the Jayhawks have mined the possibilities beyond those narrow confines. While the uninitiated who are curious about the band’s Americana output are advised to start with Hollywood Town Hall, this trio of reissues, with their insightful liners and mostly unreleased bonus tracks, are a treat for longtime fans.

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This article originally appeared in VG‘s December ’14 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.

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Stan Martin is a keeper of the traditional country music flame. He’s a Don Rich/Danny Gatton-schooled Telecaster-loving guitar picker, a virtuoso who is not a showoff. And he’s a skilled writer and musician who is unabashedly, unapologetically country.

Martin’s original songs have a moving, sometime comic, honesty. He retains a romantic toughness, as with some of Waylon Jennings early 1970s tunes written before the outlaw stance became a circus act.

As usual, Martin is supported by well-matched players like steel player Pat Severs. He adds Dobro to complement the melancholy of Martin’s languid waltz, “Damn This Town,” then returns to the steel to trade light-hearted-but-serious licks with Martin’s Tele on “Reasons For Drinking You Gone,” the honky-tonk dance tune that follows.

A darker, almost sinister rocker, “Running Away” hints at the mood of the album’s powerful closer, “Wrapped Around Your Finger,” which is one of the best tunes Martin’s ever released. It’s big and dramatic without being overblown or overwrought.

This song is a dramatic example of how Martin’s playing resonates emotionally as much as musically. And that’s what the really good ones are going for.

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This article originally appeared in VG‘s December ’14 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.

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