What a treat! The beautiful Lucinda Williams bowed to the holy shadows of the unsurpassed the other day The Beatles, that in this pre-holiday time, after so many thirsty years, it awakens again in us all that is human, loving, wise, amazing, ingenious, delightful, touching, defiant, joyful, gentle, painful, real. On the eve of the 44th anniversary of the shocking death John Lennon, this southern lady mustered all her strength to give us an authentic portrait of herself Beatlemania in youth.
Lucinda Gail Williams (b. January 26, 1953 in Louisiana), is a unique phenomenon on the American alternative folk i country scene. In short, her Blazer it was created decades before this term was even thought of in the boudoirs of the make-up music press. Because Lucinda literally went through all the terrible calvaries on the way to her own musical throne, which - you guessed it - is still woven from thorns and stars (and with three The Grammys crowned!), never playing it safe and bare-chested constantly charging at the bayonets of the wickedly fickle and unsteady human race.
Now, it's a great thing that during her long and rebellious tenure on the music scene, Lucinda hasn't lost an iota of her personal fascination with the pantheon. rock and roll deities. With its proto-from punk by appearance, you guessed it, she was never even accepted in her early Texas days as just another cutie who wears a guitar around dogs because it looks good on her and blinks big teary eyes. Her creative struggle since 1978 was therefore - with all the accolades of her colleagues, including unquestionable doyens like Tom Petty and the ill-fated Vic Chesnutt - so difficult and unceasing, that on the occasion of the release of her last year's album Stories from a Rock n Roll Heart and autobiographies Don't Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You: A Memoir, somewhere called the last living outlaw and a person who sincerely dedicated his life to music as his only true religion.
What a woman, what can I say!
One moment from the biography must be mentioned - Miss Williams suffered a stroke in the pandemic year of 2020, which almost took away her voice and ability to play the guitar. Since then, she has successfully recovered through the enjoyment of her only elixir - music. That's right, within its own discography series Lu's Jukebox as early as 2021, she recorded album tributes to Tom Petty, a southerner soulu, to his great teacher Bob Dylan, country 1960s classics and Christmas (Runnin' Down a Dream: A Tribute to Tom Petty, Southern Soul: From Memphis to Muscle Shoals, Bob's Back Pages: A Night of Bob Dylan Songs, Funny How Time Slips Away: A Night of 60's Country Classics, Have Yourself a Rockin' Little Christmas with Lucinda), so that in January 2022 she will make the same bow to her heroes The Rolling Stones (Lu's Jukebox Vol.. 6 - You Are Cordially Invited...A Tribute to the Rolling Stones), and this December 6, 2024, finally to perhaps the greatest of all - their and everyone's teenage idols The Beatles (Lu's Jukebox Vol.. 7 - Lucinda Williams sings the Beatles from Abbey Road).
The very selection of tracks testifies to Lucinda's distinguished taste. There are no catchy songs here, nor the senseless exclusivity of fan selections. All "Bubes" are, in short, in their number, because there are original works of her former girlfriends - Paul and George, but also John Lennon, of course, as well as Ringo Starr. Opening with Don't let me down, Williams seems to instantly return us to the period of the RTB School Program and the Michael Lindsay-Hogg film shown there about the Beatles' performance on the roof of the building at the time of the recording of the album Let It Be - when we were small children - as well as our first personal experiences with the famous Blue album, published under license in the then SFRY.
It follows I'm Looking Through You with a zest that will reach its crescendo already in the next frenetic one Can't Buy Me Love, which brings back memories of the tall and beautiful Jonny Štulic in 1991, who in the elevator Belgrade women he confides that he only listens to early Beatles albums these days. A song Rain here it acts as a kind of psychedelic respite that further testifies to the depth of Lucinda's amorous fervor, while While My Guitar Gently Weeps evokes the noble color of Harrison's guitar to such an extent, that we will cry in front of this beauty only at the next Let It Be, where fingers on the strings monumentally replace Paul's piano. But Lennon Yer Blues really breaks down, as arguably the centerpiece of this record, closest to Lucinda's austere sensibility and unyielding intimate history. How only dear John brought into this brilliant narrative of his a transformed famous verse of Hank Williams, native family mythology and Dylan's Mr. Jones, and Lucinda sang it all with the conviction of an owner of an equally cracked soul, aww.
That this howl at the end of the previous sentence is not accidental at all, will show you the overall sound of the album Lucinda Williams sings the Beatles from Abbey Road which, as someone already said, is more reminiscent of the growling of a coyote than the filigree work of the fabulous Liverpool foursome. But Lucinda Williams scribbled exactly that heavy Beatles song blues side in the selected songs, not even so much in terms of the actual presence of this genre, as by holding on to the edge of their typical melancholy, capturing that spleen in verses and moods, to overcome the labyrinth of the impressive task she set before herself.
And once she sifted through her gold digger's testicle such a treasure - it was easy. Because Lucinda is the grandmaster of pushing the Sisyphus stone up the hill, determined, persistent and stubborn in her own way. Admittedly, an entire hill had to be pushed here, but even that was as easy as beans for her, right? It is not too much to pronounce such a judgment: somehow they are only with this heart roots with a dedication to the Beatles - they finally arrived in America.
By the end of the record, Lucinda will be singing with an almost Rolling Stones fervor I've Got a Feeling, letting his voice soar high in the euphoria of the joyous connection of the whole band. I'm So Tired will re-invoke John Lennon's humor in a song about the "modesty" he experienced decades before all the follies, in order to Something drew spiritual curtains on the windows of our little heart. And if you hear yourself singing at the top of your voice with Lucinda that: "I don't know, I don't know!", you will know that this woman ignited your desire to be alive again.
They remain for the end. With a Little Help from My Friends in a luxurious hippie style and gloomy The Long and Winding Road which Lucinda Williams performs with all the right of the one who knows and who himself was often beaten on those same virtuous rich people. The choice of songs, it becomes clear, inadvertently also describes her life's journey. What else to add.
These days Lucinda Williams recounts with a smile how at Abbey Road studios they were not sure they knew who she was at first, but her victory is all the greater. Lucinda entered this mythical place to record an album of Beatles songs for a few days, as the first author who had the opportunity to do so within these legendary walls, among which they created themselves The Fab Four. And she did it like any of us anonymous admirers, in her own way and for her own soul. In fact, Lucinda wove her straightened heart into Beatles songs to make them her own. Congratulations, girl! Records are recorded to be listened to, and we will return to this one, to always remind ourselves of who we are and what we are.
