Covered In Folk: Lucinda Williams
(16 covers from Ben Folds, Kaiser Cartel, Mary Lou Lord and more!)
February 2nd, 2011 — 02:32 pm
Lucinda Williams is surely better known – or at least more easily recognized – for her ragged heartbroken delivery and emotional way with a guitar than her songbook per se. But as we noted back in May of 2009, when we featured her interpretations of other peoples’ songs, it wasn’t always the case: her first Grammy win was as a songwriter, for Mary Chapin Carpenter’s 1992 performance of Passionate Kisses.
In many ways, of course, Williams’ is an unusual path towards stardom: though her 1979 debut album, comprised of all covers and traditional blues numbers, got her started on the road to success, its follow-up, Happy Woman Blues, which featured her original compositions, sold poorly, prompting an eight year hiatus from the recording industry while she built up her reputation slowly through performance, struggling to refocus her work and reinvent herself while she learned to depend on her live sets for her bread and butter.
In a world where out-of-the-gate albums so often define an artist’s trajectory, Lucinda Williams prefers to let her work mature slowly – a deliberate process which has often kept her out of the public eye during the long gap between albums, save for frequent appearance on other artists’ recordings as collaborator, and as a regular performer on tribute albums – and most agree that her best albums and songs have come later in her career. The coverage confirms it, clustering around late nineties breakthough Car Wheels On A Gravel Road, though Changed The Locks, which garnered radioplay around the country when it was first released in ’88, whetting our appetite for what would become a powerhouse career straddling folk, country, and alternative lines, also had no small success in the hands of both Tom Petty and, more recently, in Kasey Chambers’ live sets.
Having said it before, I’ve less to say this time around, though you’re encouraged, as always, to head back in time to check out our original post on Lucinda as channeler of song, a portrait of the artist in evolution. Enjoy the set, and the tribute.
- Phosphorescent: Big Red Sun Blues
Sparse, spacey, and stunningly slow indiefolk from a 2009 American Songwriter session with Matthew Houck, aka Phosphorescent.
- Red Molly: Can’t Let Go
- Laura Tsaggaris: Can’t Let Go
Two vastly different yet equally energetic versions: Red Molly‘s full-trio take, off last year’s James, comes tinged with bluegrass and sweet harmonies; Laura Tsaggaris‘ driving acoustic rock guitar and tambourine come on like a train on its way off the rails.
- Kaiser Cartel: Something About What Happens When We Talk
Bluesy Brooklyn-based folkpop duo Kaiser Cartel channel Lucinda with a bit more reverb and a touch of sweetness absent in the original. From the Rock Island EP.
- Kasey Chambers w/ Dead Ringer Band: Just Wanted To See You So Bad
- Kasey Chambers: Changed The Locks
The queen of Aussie countryfolk takes on a twofer, with sixteen years between ‘em: a firey live take on oft-covered Changed The Locks, and a crisp team effort on Just Wanted To See You from 1995 release Home Fires, now back in print on Chambers’ website.
- Mary Lou Lord: Hard Road
One-time Boston busker and grungefolk goddess Mary Lou Lord went countrified for a split EP with fellow underground artist Sean Na Na in 2000. It worked.
- Duane Jarvis: Still I Long For Your Kiss
A tender, bluesy alt-country guitar ballad from an undersung West-coast country-rocker. Jarvis, who died of colon cancer at age 51 in 2009, actually cowrote this song with Lucinda, releasing his own take three years after Car Wheels hit the road.
- Mary Chapin Carpenter: Passionate Kisses
The obvious choice, AAA radio-ready and heavily rock-influenced; a double-Grammy winner, for performance and song, and you can hear why. Oh, Mary – we’re long overdue for a feature, aren’t we?
- Emmylou Harris: Sweet Old World
Slow, mournful, and inimitably Emmylou, circa her Wrecking Ball reinvention.
- Laura Cantrell: Letters
A live take featured on Laura Cantrell’s website. The girlish voice makes it sweet; the mandolin and ragged Grateful Dead harmonies, chief among other old-time elements, make it timeless.
- Ruthie Foster: Fruits of My Labor
One-time folkie gone blues singer Ruthie Foster turns in a loose, soulful plea for love and recognition, chock full of metaphor and deep meaning. From The Phenomenal Ruthie Foster, and she is.
- Ben Folds: Side of the Road
- Veruca Salt: Side of the Road
- Mae Robertson: Side of the Road
- Ellis Paul & Vance Gilbert: Side of the Road
Four vastly different approaches to a favorite original that manages to swing both anthemic and intimate, when done right. Ben Folds‘ live piano-rock ballad soars; Mae Robertson‘s fluid contemporary folk approach is tender and sweet; grungegirls Veruca Salt go deeply emo-pop, and it works out fine. And though Vance Gilbert and Ellis Paul’s 2003 collaborative album teeters on the edge of cheese throughout, the duet ballad they chose as their title track is a tempered success.
Looking for more Lucinda? Check out her newest project, a collaboration with Ray Davies which reimagines 1970 ballad A Long Way From Home, on See My Friends, an album of classic Kinks songs redone with special guests from Metallica to Mumford & Sons.