West

Lucinda Williams | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 13, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Lost Highway
• ASIN: B000LXHGFI
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (182 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,365 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #29 in Music > Folk > Contemporary Folk > Alternative Folk

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Though the arrangements stray from Lucinda Williams's motherlode blend of blues, country, and folk, West may well be her best album. It is easily her most musically adventurous, and often her most lyrically inspired. Williams's singing has never sounded better, from the aching tenderness of "Where Is My Love?" to the ravaged catharsis of "Unsuffer Me." New York producer Hal Willner, who has worked with artists such as Marianne Faithful and Lou Reed, enlists the support of eclectic progressives like guitarist Bill Frisell, keyboardist Bob Burger, and violinist Jenny Scheinman, along with harmonies from the Jayhawks' Gary Louris, to weave a subtly rich sonic tapestry. Much of the material was inspired by the death of Williams's beloved mother ("Mama You Sweet," "Fancy Funeral") and the bitter breakup of a relationship (the jagged-edged emasculation of "Come On," the repetitive incantation of "Wrap My Head Around That"), though "Are You Alright?," "Learning How to Live," and "Everything Has Changed" could reflect the aftermath of both. Other highlights include "Rescue," with a languid subtlety and ambient pulse reminiscent of Beth Orton, and the dreamy, wistful title track. Where Williams's music has long cut close to the bone, the best of West slices right through it. --Don McLeese

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Product Description

With West, a disc that may well be Lucinda Williams' most personal work to date, the singer-songwriter channels both her emotion and restive creative energy into a startling set of songs that touch on both darkness and redemption. At turns strikingly spare and compellingly muscular, the album's 13 cuts attest to her willingness to stretch as a musician -- and to put herself on the line as a chronicler of life. This vinyl edition is pressed on 180 gram vinyl. --This text refers to the Vinyl edition.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

62 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A bluesy mix with a note of hope and redemption., March 2, 2007

By 

joemacktheknife (East Hampton, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: West (Audio CD)

It may only be March but I have to say that this is going to be one of my records of the year.
Lucinda Williams has always been a peerless songwriter.She writes about lust, love, and losslike nobody else, and on this album, co-produced with Hal Wilner, she takes on such subjects as her mother's death, the state of the world, and yet another tumultuous relationship which ended badly. It's her usual tough stuff, but this time, Lucinda sneaks in a note of hope and even redemption in the very bluesy mix.
The album's 13 songs together form a largely down-tempo disc, but "West" doesn't only find Williams in a somber mood.
"Mama You Sweet" is upbeat and "Come On" is a nasty, almost raunchy kiss-off, musically akin to "Atonement" from her last album, 2003's "World Without Tears".
She injects doses of hope and light in tracks like "What If", in which she imagines a world where the president wears pink and a prostitute is a queen.
There are uncomfortable truths here, carried on easy-going melodies. "Fancy Funeral" is a wry look at death's priorities that flows as easily as drink.
Williams lost her mother and an errant lover as these songs were being written. These two truncated relationships fill "West" with exquisitely turned suffering; Williams and band provides the expert musical succour. Hal Wilner is the producer who organised this record's quietly unconventional sounds as Williams wanted them.
Equally raw and sensual is the unravelling blues of "Unsuffer Me", where Williams's ravaged voice begs: "Undo my logic/ Undo my fear" with an intensity that verges on the erotic.
Subtle and heroically blunt by turns, "West" is a meditation on abandonment and recovery, abandon and regret that deserves to be hauled out of the Americana ghetto and celebrated everywhere wounded hearts beat.
This collection sees her at her best with emotion, raw power and intoxicating, intense tunes which should appeal to much more than country and folk fans.
Four years on from "World Without Tear"s comes this studio album from Lucinda Williams, her eighth in a 37-year career - she doesn't rush.
OK, the predominant theme is pain, and no one does pain as eloquently as Lucinda - or as multifariously.
Yet "West" is all musical mood swings: from stoic, heartbreak country to fierce revenge rock, retro pop to folk, poetry to rap, mellow California to dark LA rock.
What makes Lucinda Williams such an important country artist, besides the excellent songwriting and that sultry, scarred southern voice, is her skill at stretching the genre's boundaries while mining its essence.
Which, often as not, is pain.

40 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars So intense., February 21, 2007

By 

Esthero - See all my reviews

This review is from: West (Audio CD)

"West" is Lucinda's eighth studio album and simply quite brilliant. Nobody does that low-down dirty country blues like Lucinda, locking into a languid, aching groove and sending shivers down the spine of any living thing within range of that earthy vibrato.
Not that she is interested in staying within some country comfort zone, "Wrap My Head Around That" straying into uncharted territory.
It is not the first time she has slowed a lyric to spoken level, but this is a rhythmic bona fide country rap epic, a compelling narrative over nine minutes long, punctuated by snarling guitar chops and solos.

"Words" is another wise old tale written on that cracked parchment of a voice, wafting over an intoxicating melody.

She quotes her father, literature and poetry professor Miller Williams on West's sleeve notes: "You do not know what wars are going on down there where the spirit meets the bone", and these songs are a product of an internal turmoil caused by her mother's death and an intense relationship that spectacularly crashed and burned.

Put brutally selfishly, Lucinda's loss is our gain, gut-wrenching songs like "Unsuffer Me" burn with the agony and ecstasy of "Essence", and "Fancy Funeral" has the rare power to reduce grown men and women to tears.
She has assembled a great band including Bill Frisell, Jim Keltner and her long-time guitarist, the superb Doug Petibone, who do ample justice to this scintillating set of songs.
I like it. You will be moved, to say the least.

129 of 151 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Everything Has Changed, February 17, 2007

By 

Lee Armstrong (Winterville, NC United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: West (Audio CD)

On August 10, 2005 Lucinda Williams played at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh. It was the last live concert that my wife and I saw together. Lucinda was touring in support of "Live @ the Fillmore" & said she was writing songs for a new record. As I recall, she played a new song she said she'd recently written, "Everything Has Changed." I preordered Lucinda's "West" set while my wife was still here. Today marks the fourth week since breast cancer ripped a giant unfillable hole in my universe. Lucinda lost her mother; and so themes of adjustment to loss not only resonate with me, they punctuate every breath I take. I spin the CD & Lucinda's gentle aching voice comes on, "Are you alight?" When people ask me that, I want to say, "He*l no!" But when she sings, "All of a sudden you went away; I hope you come back around someday; I haven't seen you in a real long time; Could you give me some kind of sign? Are you alright? ...Cause I've been feeling a little scared," it sounds like she's tapped into my inner dialogue as I look toward heaven and speak to the one I love. What an amazing song, "Just tell me that you're okay." If this were the only song on the CD, it'd be worth it.

"Unsuffer Me" is a grueling unflinching look at the pain of loss. Sometimes you have to stare it in the face to get through it. "Anoint my head with your sweet kiss, my joy is dead; I long for bliss," she sings as what I assume is Dan Pettibone's electric guitar churns mercilessly. Yet somehow the song achieves a magical dignity. During my wife's last weeks, my daughter said to me, "It's like watching a train wreck; you can't look away." There something of that strength that comes through in Williams' music.

Other cuts are also amazing. "Learning How to Live" is a breakup song, adjusting to loss. "Fancy Funeral" may sound a bit bizarre, but I can attest that my daddy and I had almost an exact same conversation in 2001 when my mother passed. The sheer force of Lucinda's anger in "Come On" puts a smile on my face as a classic bashed-breakup song, "Dude, you're so fired; shut up, I'm not inspired." "Words" has Lucinda's voice, weathered, worn & laden taking comfort in something she likes best, writing a good song.

Yes, Lucinda has an amazing catalog of recordings from "Happy Woman Blues" to the self-titled record to Car Wheels & World Without Tears. "West" takes a well deserved place at the table as one of her most compelling, moving works. Bravo!