Lucinda Williams’s nearly half-century recording career has always been characterized by literate lyrics and strong musicianship, but just as importantly, by heartfelt sentiments. It still is, though recent events have ostensibly prompted the singer to change the focus of those sentiments. On early standouts like “Passionate Kisses,” “Something About What Happens When We Talk,” and […]
Lucinda Williams World’s Gone Wrong Lucinda Williams is pissed off. And now she’s given us World’s Gone Wrong, the protest album I have been waiting for, a set of songs that speak plainly and forcefully to the dark moment we are living through without hedging or nostalgia. Political songs are notoriously hard to pull off. […]
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Bentley’s Bandstand: Favorite Albums of 2025: (second half) Rodney Crowell, AIRLINE HIGHWAY. There is something about artists like Rodney Crowell that shares such a powerful sound from note one that there is never any question they’ve hit it out of the park. Again. It’s been that way forever with the best music. The song starts […]
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Finding Lucinda Documentary “Why?” has always been the most unanswerable musical question for me, both as a writer and a fan. Why do we gravitate toward certain artists, but not others? Why do seemingly more talented songwriters toil in virtual obscurity while anonymous songwriting mills crank out hit after shitty hit? And why does hard […]
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Music & Film Reviews: Southside Johnny ‘Live at Rockpalast,’ plus Lucinda Williams, Lightnin’ Hopkins, and Emily Remler Southside Johnny came up through the same Asbury Park, New Jersey–area bars and clubs as Bruce Springsteen, with whom he has often shared stages. He also attended school with the E Street Band’s Garry Tallent and Vini Lopez; […]
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Bentley’s Bandstand: November 2024 By Bill Bentley Jeremie Albino, OUR TIME IN THE SUN. Sometimes there is a musician who walks into the front of the crowds and makes their presence well-known on the first verse of the opening song on a new album. It’s instantaneous, and can’t be plotted. It’s because the artist has […]
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Top 25 Albums for AMA’s 25th Anniversary Year 25 years ago, spurred by conversations that took place at South by Southwest in Austin, the Americana Music Association became a reality. In September 2000, the nascent organization held its first conference in Nashville. Two years later, the Americana Honors and Awards came into being. As the […]
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Lucinda Williams has recorded lots of country- and soul-flavored music over her four-decade career, but her heart has always been in rock, a fact she reaffirms on her effusive latest CD, her first collection of new material since 2020’s Good Souls Better Angels. Like that album, the just-released Stories from a Rock n Roll Heart […]
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Lucinda Williams Brings Her “Real Life Stories” to Annapolis Songwriter’s Festival September 16, 2022 “Telling real life stories, that’s my role” Americana trailblazer Lucinda Williams told the enthusiastic audience at Maryland Hall in Annapolis, capping the second day of the first Annapolis Songwriters Festival. The relationship between Williams and her audience was at the center […]
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