Tiffany Williams - All Those Days Of Drinking Dust

Self-released

****1/2

Tiffany Williams’ debut album fully delivers on the promise of her critically acclaimed WHEN YOU GO and I’LL BE BACK SOON EPs. Among the contenders in the ever-burgeoning traditional country-folk, mountain song genre, there are a lot of pretenders and acts trying desperately to ‘look and play the part,’ but five seconds in front of Tiffany Williams and you know you’re dealing with the real thing. What I like about this album is that she shares with us a collection of well-written originals that could be conceived as traditional folk songs. One way I might describe this combination of material is that all of these songs seem that they will remain timeless. This is the sign of a well thought out, arranged and well written album. It is probably Tiffany’s background as a published author and former high school English teacher that is the reason her brand of folk-country orbits closely around her voice and words more-so than the average musician, yet this is what gives the album its undeniable uniqueness. The songs are very American telling very female stories of rising up and becoming something. Mistress of minor-key introspection, her songs carry the kind of emotional weight more often associated with a battle-scuffed veteran. This is raw and uncompromising music that taps into both deeply personal trauma and wider societal ills for influence. Songs of lonesomeness, heartbreak, drinking and loss telling it straight from the Appalachian Mountains, with the plunk of banjos, the scrape of fiddles and picking of guitars in search of the musical roots and branches of her Kentucky upbringing.

Tiffany grew up in a coal-mining family—her father, grandfather and great grandfather all went down the mines—despite not having worked the mines, she captures the awful conditions they had to endure in the title song. Far away tones carve out a moody arrangement for her to showcase her storytelling skills as she shares their experiences in a style of vicious, black-hearted hillbilly that often sounds as if it were born in a dark, isolated holler. On Harder Heart. she sings about being way too forgiving. The track epitomises the whole album, a song that slowly expands on a diet of equal parts, controlled sadness and producer Lundy’s restrained arrangement. Know Your Worth blends precocious lyricism, spare, jangly guitar and banjo, and a world-weary voice that sounds older than her years. The Sea is full of heart-breaking vulnerability portraying the turmoil of unrequited love and longing. A rattly, loose-limbed ramble laid back so far it’s about to fall over, Ben Sollee hovering around overhead and behind injecting mellow cello bursts into the conversation.

When I Come Back Around is a strong acoustic, banjo-driven country-style song. A duet with Silas House, this is about a couple who treasure their own freedom, yet still care deeply for each other. It doesn’t hurt that Tiffany and Silas’ voices absolutely melt into each other’s. No Bottom couldn’t be better named, as it exudes the very element it describes. Tiffany’s words ring heavy with an emotional tone of the plaintive howl of one woman reaching for the stars and having her fingers close on empty air as she falls deeper and deeper into total despair. The closing The Waiting absolutely aches with longing in deeply felt lyrics about heartache and hopelessness. Her unique songwriting shines with a literary sensibility and her ability to craft characters is on full display throughout. This is not just a good debut, but a near perfect one. The years of hard work that went into it can be felt, and Tiffany Williams’ immense talent is breathtaking.

www.tiffanywilliams.com

August 2022