What's Up!

May 3, 2020

What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!

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GET GREAT BRANSON DEALS sent directly to your phone! Text BRANSON to 82928 Message and data rates may apply. Text STOP to cancel. Go to taponitdeals.com/terms for privacy and terms. 12 WHAT'S UP! MAY 3-9, 2020 LISTEN HERE! Williams' 'Good Souls' Is Anything But Subtle Lucinda Williams 'Good Souls Better Angels' Highway 20/Thirty Tigers Lucinda Williams has come up with an album for our times — at least if you're as angry as she is. "Good Souls, Better Angels" is anything but subtle. Williams takes on "fools and thieves and clowns and hypo- crites" — and that's just in one song, "Bad News Blues." Oh, and she gets after the devil, too. And President Donald Trump, in "Man With- out a Soul." That song's hook isn't especially clever, and the politics aren't for everybody. The starring role, though, goes to Williams' spectacular band. Guitarist Stuart Mathis, bassist David Sutton and drummer Butch Norton jam out as Williams repeatedly shouts, "It's coming down." Comparisons are risky, but the playing evokes Neil Young of "Like a Hurricane" vintage. It's fiery, righteous and emphatic, like the soundtrack to someone leaving a murder scene. Williams is less blunt on "Big Black Train," a song about depression, and "Wakin' Up," which touches on domes- tic violence. Even then, it's the band that elevates an ordinary hook — "I'm waking up from a bad dream" — to something more. The mellower cuts are more constructive. On "When the Way Gets Dark," the band matches the unsettled mood of Williams' languid, encouraging vocals. On "Good Souls," a gorgeous prayer of a song, Williams recaptures the Velvet Underground-influ- enced magic she harnessed a few years ago with her cover of J.J. Cale's "Magnolia." Superlatives can be tricky with new music. Sometimes you have to let it sink in a little, see how it holds up over time. You might be left to wonder later what everybody was so mad about. The bet here, though, is that Williams and her band have captured the spirit of the moment. Not everyone will see things as she does, but no one will miss the point. The White Buffalo 'On the Widow's Walk' Snakefarm/Spinefarm Records The White Buffalo is Jake Smith's stage and recording name, one of the most accu- rate monikers in the business, seemingly preordained. His rumbling voice carries emotion and authority, his songs are tales of loss, loneliness and desires, and his music digs deep into the earth. On his new album, "On the Widow's Walk," producer Shooter Jennings adds piano and keyboards to help stretch the corners of the big Ameri- cana quilt, but the focus stays on Smith's storytelling. Opener "Problem Solution" is one of the aforementioned stretching exercises, a lengthy track with guitars driving head-on into the fray — "Tell me what's wrong with my brain/Does it like to be stuck in the drain." Halfway through it turns into a Ben Folds/ Ringo Starr collaboration before fading with a slightly psychedelic ending. Weird and wonderful. "The Drifter" is so bummed out he's not even sure who to blame, while the ties that bind have been loosened on "No History," which has the simply irresistible rhythm of a Bob Seger rocker. On both, Smith's quavering voice shows a kinship with Eddie Vedder's. "Cursive" is one of the best of the bunch, Jennings' keyboards underpinning the drama of a poignant song that tackles our increasing dependence on technology and which the pandemic has made too close for comfort: "And if we stop touching each other/Please tell me what will we be/We'll be just like the drones/Together yet alone in captivity." Tragedy is caused by nature in "River of Love and Loss" but its mood is like a murder ballad's. It seems of a pair with "The Rapture," whose menacing tale will freeze smiles at any campfire sing- along. "I Don't Know a Thing About Love" closes the album with a credible exhibition of vulner- ability. Listening to The White Buffalo's songs on the road will make you take the long way home so you can enjoy them a little while more. — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

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