Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - 'Summer In The Southeast' (Drag City) Released 07/11/05

Unforthcoming in his rare interviews, prone to hiding behind pseudonyms – Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, variations of Palace – and cultivating something of a bogus backwoods dweller image, Will Oldham is quite a slippery enigma. Summer In The Southeast, the first-ever live album in Oldham’s hectic release schedule (a covers album with post-rock luminaries Tortoise will follow shortly), allows a few insights to the mysterious songwriter. 

First of all, this 17-track cruise through choice selections from Oldham’s extensive back catalogue includes enough botched cues, off-key harmonies and general messiness to suggest he’s not on first-name terms with rehearsing. Give it a bit of time, though, and what initially sounds like Oldham and his six-piece band – itself a dramatic departure from his often stripped-down recordings – stumbling drunkenly into one another begins to sound energised, electrifying, even joyous. 

Shockingly, the man whose simultaneously unsettling and starkly beautiful output features prominently on the list of reasons for alt. country’s reputation as a one-dimensional domain of despair and gloom emerges here as blatantly fun-loving. Also, having recently subjected his earlier tunes to a honky tonkin’ retuning in the hands of Nashville session musos, he’s keen to rock out. As a result, while a tune entitled ‘Death for Everyone’, a downright miserable lament in its recorded version to boot, might not promise much party anthem potential, here the song is fleshed out to a raw, ragged and riveting ode to living complete with communal whooping and hollering. Alas, the light-hearted approach works less well in the comedy howling that disfigures the tender ‘Wolf Among Wolves’.

Elsewhere, Oldham belies his demand for a “tune that all can carry” in the singalong sea shanty ‘Madeleine Mary’ by failing to locate the correct key once during a painful mauling of his finest song, the mournfully majestic, Johnny Cash-covered ‘I See A Darkness’. Thankfully, plentiful great performances – a menacing ‘A Sucker’s Evening’, a ramshackle ‘May It Always Be’, a sparse solo treatment of ‘Nomadic Revery’, the easy, breezy stroll of ‘Ease Down the Road’ and a reverential recital of ‘Beast for Thee’ from the superb Superwolf album – more than compensate. Frequently inspired, often exhilarating in its spontaneity but very, very light on polish and gloss, Summer In The Southeast may leave Oldham novices scratching their heads in bewilderment. For devotees, however, it’s the second best thing to having been there.