Bonnie 'Prince' Billy Sings Greatest Palace Music CD

Those who like the earlier versions of these songs may take issue with the cleaned-up updates and how the steady vocals of Bonnie "Prince" Billy-era Oldham supplant his Palace-era yelp. But there is something undeniably intriguing about hearing "Ohio River Boat Song" with a female backing chorus and weeping, countrified electric guitar, or rich strings and saxophone supplementing "Viva Ultra." The songs themselves, of course, are strong as ever, and many Palace music devotees will enjoy hearing them recast. The top-notch production and country arrangements should win some new converts to Oldham's back catalogue as well.

The most un-Will Oldham-like of Oldham's releases, SINGS GREATEST PALACE MUSIC finds the singer/songwriter returning to the material he wrote in the 1990s under the monikers Palace Songs, Palace Brothers, and Palace Music. The twist here is two-fold. Oldham sings in the voice he developed recording under the name Bonny "Prince" Billy--an understated, clear tenor, which bears little resemblance to the ragged, throaty vocals he employed with Palace. He also invites a host of high-profile Nashville session men to flesh out the record, making the whole sound decidedly more mainstream than devotees of Oldham's indie aesthetic have come to expect.

Personnel includes: Bonnie "Prince" Billy (vocals); Eddie Bayers, Stuart Duncan, Mike Johnson, Bruce Watkins, Mark Fain, Hargus Robbins.

Rolling Stone (3/18/04, p.72) - 3 stars out of 5 - "Oldham doesn't cover so much as reinvent spare Palace tunes such as "Ohio River Boat Song" and "Gulf Shores" into lush countrypolitian numbers."
Spin (p.108) - "[M]ost of these jaunty retoolings are a rhinestone-studded joy." - Grade: B+
Uncut (4/04, p.93) - 4 stars out of 5 - "[P]ossibly the most straightforwardly enjoyable album Oldham has produced thus far....He sounds more human, less theatrical, touchingly direct."
Uncut (p.76) - Ranked #43 in Uncut's "Best New Albums of 2004" - "[A] stunning collection of wryly provocative country ballads with a blackly humorous twist."
CMJ (3/15/04, p.4) - "[H]is now-solid voice is confident, as though years of inexplicable yearning have made him wiser....Oldham's disenchantment has finally been refigured into a brilliant new eloquence."
Dirty Linen (p.83) - "These sounds are amazingly fresh, vibrant, and a breath of fresh air..."
Mojo (Publisher) (4/04, p.126) - "[B]eefed up country-style with big guitars, rollicking piano, fiddling fiddles and loud pedal steel....An agreeable curio..."