Essential Listening #1: Lucinda Williams "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road"

My first selection for Essential Listening for your Girls Turntable is "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road" by Lucinda Williams.

Much has been written about the album's history, in which Ms. Williams infamously battled in the studio with various producers and label executives for six year to find the right sound and capture her artistic vision for the recordings.  Her persistence paid off, and when the album was eventually released in 1998, it was lauded with critical praise, earning a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album.

But for those who did not know its history, one might assume it was recorded in a single late night session.  A group of musicians jamming together after a long summer day in a crowded room filled with smoke.  Bourbon and cold beer fueling the night.  At least this is the picture that comes to my mind.  Each track comes together in such an effortless fashion, it's hard for me to disassociate the Southern juke joint imagery conveyed throughout the songs with the recording session itself.  On par with the literary work of Flannery O'Connor and other Southern Gothic writers that have influenced her writing, Ms. Williams' album establishes a sense of tone and place that is inescapable after even one listen. 



Individually, "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road" is marked by several songs that stand out as significant contributions to the canon of work we now call Americana.  (A genre arguably created in an attempt to categorize Ms. Williams, who falls on the peripheral far beyond the comfort zone of today's pop-driven country music.)



Listen to the entire album on Spotify.