Lucinda Williams Essence CD

"Get Right With God" won the 2002 Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance.

The follow-up to Lucinda Williams's commercial/critical breakthrough CAR WHEELS ON A GRAVEL ROAD is anything but a market-geared, commercial effort. Rather, ESSENCE is the sound of lovelorn melancholy being delicately bottled, then gently let loose in a recording studio with a group of skilled roots-rockers to ease it along on its way to the microphone. The tender beauty of these heart-on-sleeve tunes goes hand in hand with the overwhelming, unapologetic misery of the sentiments expressed in the lyrics. As always, Williams displays her gift for getting the maximum poetic mileage out of the simplest verbal structures. The simply rendered images of heartbreak and emotional isolation are organic and resonant, those qualities being shared by the earthy but carefully arranged production that frames Williams's plaints. The mixture of looseness and purposefulness (along with the album's emotional tone) puts ESSENCE in the same general ballpark as Bob Dylan's Daniel Lanois-produced angst fest TIME OUT OF MIND.

Recorded at Mastermix Studios, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Personnel: Lucinda Williams (acoustic guitar, electric guitar, resonator guitar); Charlie Sexton (vocals, acoustic guitar, acoustic 12-string guitar, electric guitar, 12-string guitar, slide guitar, piano, drums, percussion, background vocals); Jim Lauderdale (vocals, background vocals); Bo Ramsey (electric guitar, slide guitar); David Mansfield (violin, viola); Reese Wynans (organ); Tony Garnier (acoustic bass); Jim Keltner (drums, percussion); Gary Louris, Joy Lynn White (background vocals).

Audio Mixer: Tom Tucker.

Recording information: Mastermix Studios, Minneapolis, MN.

Photographer: Alan Messer.

Personnel includes: Lucinda Williams (vocals, acoustic guitar); Joy Lynn White (vocals); Charlie Sexton (guitar, loops); Bo Ramsey (resolectric guitar); David Mansfield (violin, viola); Reese Wyanans (Hammond B3 organ); Tony Garnier (acoustic bass); Jim Keltner (drums, percussion); Jim Lauderdale (background vocals).

Producers: Lucinda Williams, Charlie Sexton, Bo Ramsey, Tom Tucker.

Rolling Stone (5/24/01, p.84) - 3.5 stars out of 5 - "...ESSENCE finds Williams returning to the willful intimacy of her earliest records. Laid-back, rock-ish and small in scale....[The album] is spotty and sweet, winningly imperfect and often striking..."
Spin (1/02, p.77) - Ranked #13 in Spin's "Albums of the Year 2001".
Spin (7/01, p.125) - 8 out of 10 - "...As halting, spare and downbeat as its predecessor [CAR WHEELS ON A GRAVEL ROAD] was giddy, verbose, and downbeat....by stripping down, [she] tests herself against the universals that underlie her music's power....Strange stuff..."
Entertainment Weekly (12/28/01, p.138) - Ranked #9 "Album of the Year" in EW's "Best of 2001".
Entertainment Weekly (6/8/01, p.74) - "...Her folkiest, gentlest album...a steamy slow-crawl that plays into her strengths as the Joan of Dark of the alt-country set..." - Rating: B+
Q (7/01, p.125) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...A swift, superb follow-up....with a more bluesy, intimate sound....Almost essential."
Mojo (Publisher) (1/02, p.69) - Ranked #16 in Mojo's "Best [40] Albums of 2001".
Mojo (Publisher) (7/01, p.98) - "...Stellar writing and performing. The lovesick blues haven't sounded better."