Bonnie Prince Billy - Master & Everyone

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Music reviews of Master & Everyone

Music Review: Junkmedia Review- Solid, if not exceptional
Rating: 4 Stars

Oldham's caustic and completely unique approach to American folk music has always stood out from the droves of roots-music ramblers and ersatz Dylan singer/songwriters. His first two albums conceived under the guise of The Palace Brothers, There Is No One What Will Take Care of You and Days in the Wake, revealed Oldham as a weathered wanderer: His gravelly tenor focused on love, death and religion while relating experiences that were well beyond the years that his still young face wore.

As good as his early releases were, and still are, Oldham was known best for his lyrical content. Barring the rock excursions on 1995's excellent Viva Last Blues, his arrangements were merely appropriate until, oddly, after he christened himself Bonnie 'Prince' Billy. It was then that his music as a whole became greater than its parts. Piano accompaniment, percussion and rich backing vocals dressed "I See a Darkness" and "Ease Down the Road" in a warm shade of black, making them perfect companions for your breaking heart.

His newest Bonnie 'Prince' Billy installment, Master and Everyone, is not the follow-up that everyone is likely expecting. It is, more importantly, a good album that finds Oldham retreating from the layered solemnity of his most recent releases in favor of a mood that is as intimate and delicate as it is bittersweet and biting.

The album opens with Oldham singing Winter comes and snow/ I can't marry you ya' know, as if it were a lullaby -- and even though it's not. Each squeak of the chair, each toe tapped on the floor, every deep breath drawn can be heard dancing among his acoustic guitar and haunting voice (The sprinkling of strings and an organ throughout the chorus do nothing to lighten the mood).

On "Ain't You Wealthy, Ain't You Wise?" Marty Slayton makes her appearance as Oldham's duet partner. Her presence, however, does nothing to keep him from ruminating on a loneliness that functions as the album's solitary theme. Shivers run up my spine when the two unapologetically harmonize, There's no pain to lament, and no dream undreamt. Tragedy, not irony -- that's why fans flock to Will Oldham concerts.

Overall, no new ground has been covered on Master and Everyone. Oldham has been known on occasion to let listeners down (anyone buy Ode Music?), but that's not the case here. There's more than enough material to keep fans happy, and, according to the opening verse of "Hard Life," there will be much more material soon.

Wake up and I'm fine, with my dreaming still on my mind
But it don't take long you see, for the demons to come
and visit me.
And I've got my problems, sometimes love don't solve them/
And I end each day, in a song.

Ronald Andryshak
February 5, 2003
Junkmedia Review

Description of Master & Everyone

Alternative Rock CDs

• Music > Styles
• Country
• Folk
• Pop
• Rock