[rating=7.00]
Even his name sounds like he’s from a couple of centuries ago. His gravelly, well-worn voice fits the part too. And, so does the cover art for that matter. William Elliott Whitmore is an Iowa-based singer-songwriter/banjoist/guitarist that doesn’t easily fit into one box. For this effort, his seventh album, Kilonova, he’s turned song interpreter. It’s different from anything else in his catalog.
Prior to this, his debut for Bloodshot, beginning with 2003’s widely hailed Hymns for the Hopeless (Southern Records) and most recently with 2015’s Radium Death (Anti), Whitmore has taken his own pen to create haunting, rustic, authentic, and sometimes political fare that stem from his entire life on the family farm. Hardcore punk elements and the hard life of a traveling troubadour weave their way into those albums too. As with his previous album, he again turns to engineer Luke Tweedy.
Here he presents ten cover songs from artists who have influenced his 15 plus-year career and if you’re at all familiar with his prior efforts, you’ll sense how these shaped his attitude and aesthetic too. There’s pain, hard-earned wisdom, and realism in Whitmore’s voice and it’s almost as if these songs were guiding posts along the way, or, one could think of them as scars or tattoos – songs that left an indelible impression. Even though some are familiar in name, they sound markedly different when channeled through him.
Elliott sounds so utterly convincing on his a cappella take on Dock Boggs’ old-timey “Country Blues,” transforms the Ray Charles hit “Busted “into a resonant dark blues tune, seemingly chastising the 1% along the way. His bellows and growls in Captain Beefheart’s “Bat Chain Puller” resemble both Beefheart and Tom Waits. In fact, Elliott moves from tender, and empathetic on his opener, Magnetic Fields’ “Fear of Trains” to twisted, raspy, and barely in control on “Bat Chain Puller.” In between we get unique interpretations of Johnny Cash’s “Five Feet High and Rising” and Bad Religion’s “Don’t Pray on Me” along with an unexpected soulful approach to ZZ Top’s “Hot Blue and Righteous” and Bill Withers’ “Ain’t No Sunshine.”
Whitmore plays throughout in relatively spare and sometimes in the sparest of accompaniments. Yet he adds some nice touches to flesh out some of the songs. “Bat Chain Puller” features an additional guitar and sax. “Busted” has a baritone guitar and drums. “Hot, Blue and Righteous” has a harmony vocalist who doubles on trumpet. “Ain’t No Sunshine” has a rhythm section.
Elliott offers, “This collection is something I’ve been wanting to put forth for a long time. A handful of these tunes I’ve been doing in live sets for years, and it just felt right to give them a little home. A place where my interpretations can live and hopefully be enjoyed. I remember as a kid hearing Johnny Cash cover Harlan Howard’s “Busted” on Live at Folsom Prison. Soon after that I became familiar with Ray Charles’ version and it was a revelation that a great song can be played in many different ways. Seems obvious now, but as a ten year old it was to shape my way of thinking about music.”
At times you might sense a punk rocker or rock n’ roller hiding in the shadows, but this is mostly William Elliott Whitmore proving he can deliver in the unadorned singer-songwriter style just fine. This time he’s just sending a few messages through the songs of others. There’s enough condemnable history, for example, in “Fear of Trains” to fill a novel.
