Bonnie "Prince" Billy
Ease Down the Road

A simple record. A serene record, with many songs that celebrate the pleasures of life and of the flesh, as well. That same flesh from which, after all, life is born and renewed. And perhaps the second record that in 2001, Will Oldham released under the moniker Bonnie "Prince" Billy (after the splendid - and abyssal - "I See A Darkness" from 1999) is really, simply, the other side of the coin, the childlike side, in Will's soul.

It's as if that trembling pain and existential uncertainty that taints and at the same time is the vital sap and inspiration in "I See A Darkness," here reconciles - in this "Ease Down The Road" - in lighter, clearer, and more reassuring atmospheres. Like this sun that finally manages, with difficulty, to overcome the morning fog, in this "beginning of spring" that starts. But is it really so? And is serenity the lasting impression this album leaves after repeated listens? Perhaps.

Sure, there are light tracks like the smile of a child in this album. From the opener "May It Always Be" to the cheerful chorus, almost like a school trip, of "Just to See My Holly Home". From the biting and pointed irony of a track like "Mrs William" to a very tender love lullaby like "After I Made Love to You". But then what remains of the soul of "I See A Darkness" in this second album of Bonnie "Prince" Billy?
A lot remains, I believe. Even if it is well hidden, more occult and elusive. Thus, it goes from the rarefied and rachitic atmosphere of a musical sketch like "Careless Love", to the dark and sweet (certainly the best track of the album) "A King at Night". A track, the latter, where the underlying theme of the man's solitude with himself reappears, albeit softened (And here-ee look and see/All there is is me/This is how I start another day in my kingdom), which is typical of Will's lyrics. A solitude and dismay that appear like a shadow in the sunset after the gentle warmth of a track like "At Break of Day" (I hate myself when I'm alone/It's just with you I feel okay/And so tomorrow you'll feel sorrow/When I am gone at break of day). Up to taking on tones of tragic desperation, of inner torture and of sanguine corporeality in a track like "Grand Dark Feeling of Emptiness". A track with very dark and vulgar tones (And now I am learning bit by bit/About the make and model shit/The muddy bowl I live in it/And all the mucks that tire us) that leaves one aghast with each listen for its ruthless harshness, which only in the last verses abandons itself to a glimmer, albeit faint, of hope. A track that closes with three completely senseless keyboard notes, three notes that instill each time in the listener a bitter sense of absurd unpredictability. Like certain destinies in life. Simply inextricable.

An uneven record, in short, but no less precious for it. An album to savor little by little, which might not be loved immediately, perhaps. But that, behind the appearance of a simple smile, hides an incredibly rich and complex soul. A soul that can finally enjoy serenity - and the clearest and purest happiness - precisely because it was forged, year after year, and song after song, in the hard workshop of the coppersmith pain.