Track Listing
Click tracks with speaker icon to listen| 1 | Sittin’ on Top of the World | 3:59 |
| 2 | Cluck Old Hen | 3:53 |
| 3 | Everybody Loves Everybody | 3:42 |
| 4 | I Want to Go Home | 4:15 |
| 5 | Single Girl, Married Girl | 3:57 |
| 6 | Get Along | 3:23 |
| 7 | John Hardy Was a Desperate Little Man | 5:17 |
| 8 | Sugar Baby | 3:51 |
| 9 | Blackberry Blossom | 4:20 |
| 10 | If I Could I Surely Would | 6:46 |
| 11 | Cluck Old Hen (reprise) | 1:50 |
| 12 | Cold, Cold Heart | 2:25 |
| 13 | I Know You Care | 3:12 |
| 14 | Goodnight Irene | 3:55 |
| 15 | Big Shoe | 4:51 |
| 16 | The Willies | 6:24 |
News & Reviews
- Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Financial Times: Five Stars for Bill Frisell and His "Spot-On Scores" to Films at Barbican Show
Fresh off yesterday's five-star review in The Guardian, Bill Frisell's tour-closing concert at the Barbican earns another five stars, from the Financial Times. For the show, the Frisell Trio performed Bill's "spot-on score" that gave "a zesty sheen" to the films of Buster Keaton, Jim Woodring, and Bill Morrison, with the Trio's musical efforts "equal partner in the audiovisual experience." The paper sums up Bill's works as "a soundscape pregnant with humour, menace and the struggle to survive."
- Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Guardian: Five Stars for Bill Frisell Trio's Film Music at the Barbican
Bill Frisell concluded his Trio tour—playing music to the films of Buster Keaton, Bill Morrison, and Jim Woodring—at the Barbican in London on Saturday as part of the London Jazz Festival. The Guardian gives a perfect five stars to the performance, in which the Trio gave "all the light and shade needed to underpin three very different film-makers' visions ... Best of all were the Buster Keaton movies The High Sign and One Week, integrating music and vision so brilliantly it was impossible to think of the event as pure film or just jazz."
About this Album
Guitarist, composer, and bandleader Bill Frisell released his 16th Nonesuch recording with The Willies. Taking the unique sound that the L.A. Weekly described “as unmistakably American as that of Charles Ives or Duke Ellington” deeper into aural explorations of American traditional music, The Willies is Frisell's characteristically inimitable and modern take on bluegrass and country blues.
The collection features eight traditional offerings including "Cluck Old Hen" and "Cold, Cold Heart," as well as eight original compositions. Produced by Lee Townsend and engineered by Tucker Martine, The Willies was recorded in Seattle at Flora Avenue Studio and features Frisell on electric and acoustic guitars and loops, Danny Barnes (Bad Livers) on banjo and guitar, and Keith Lowe (Fiona Apple, David Sylvian, and Wayne Horvitz’s Zony Mash) on bass.
“It’s hard to find a more fruitful meditation on American music than in the compositions of guitarist Bill Frisell," says the New York Times. "Mixing rock and country with jazz and blues, he’s found what connects them: improvisation and a sense of play.”
Credits
MUSICIANS
Bill Frisell electric and acoustic guitars, loops
Danny Barnes banjo, acoustic guitar, bass harmonica, pump organ
Keith Lowe bass
PRODUCTION CREDITS
Produced by Lee Townsend
Recorded at Flora Avenue Studio, Seattle
Recording and Mixing Engineer: Tucker Martine
Mixed at Different Fur Recording, San Francisco
Assistant engineer: Adam Muñoz
Mastering by Greg Calbi at Sterling Sound, New York City
All compositions by Bill Frisell (Friz-Tone Music/BMI) except “Sittin’ on Top of the World,” “Cluck Old Hen,” “Sugar Baby” and “Blackberry Blossom” (Traditional); “John Hardy Was a Desperate Little Man” and “Single Girl, Married Girl” by A.P. Carter (Peer International Corp./BMI); “Cold, Cold Heart” by Hank Williams (Acuff Rose Music Inc./BMI); and “Goodnight Irene” by Huddie Ledbetter and John A. Lomax (Ludlow Music/BMI)
Design by Gwen Terpstra
Cover art by Bill Frisell
