Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy ★★★★
The Purple Bird
DOMINO/NO QUARTER. CD/DL/LP
Made in Nashville: 12 new country songs.
WHEN JOHNNY CASH covered Will Oldham’s I See A Darkness (American III) and invited him to sing back-up, Oldham came to know Cash’s engineer and longtime musical sidekick David ‘Ferg’ Ferguson. A quarter-century later they’ve come out with this collaborative country album. Ferguson, who produced, co-wrote seven of the songs with Oldham, while others have input from half a dozen country singers, including John Anderson, Tim O’Brien, Pat McLaughlin and Tommy Prine. The songs are often slow (Boise, Idaho and One Of These Days (I’m Gonna Spend The Night With You) are lovely), sometimes more upbeat (smile-inducing Tonight With The Dogs I’m Sleeping; waltz-time Guns Are For Cowards) occasionally doomy (Is My Living In Vain?), and all backed by a rich ensemble of Nashville “cats” on guitar, fiddle, drums, bass, piano, steel and backing vocals. “When I listen to the record,” Oldham says, “I can’t help but laugh in wonder that life allowed me to participate in such a thing.”