Victoria Williams
ROOTS REFRESHMENT
Victoria Williams Brings Water from the Desert
Victoria Williams's music is, she admits, hard to classify. "I guess you could call it folk-pop, or jazz-pop-folk -- that is a tough one," she says. Her quirky vignettes of characters and lives she's encountered, her distinctive, keening vocals, and her shimmering melodies have attracted such notable fans as Lou Reed, Lucinda Williams, Pearl Jam, and Soul Asylum, who performed their favorite Williams compositions on the 1993 album Sweet Relief. That project was initially intended to help out with Williams's medical bills when she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis that year but, at her urging, it resulted in the formation of the Sweet Relief Foundation, which aids uninsured musicians. Since then, Williams's recording career has thrived, with such acclaimed albums as Loose, Musings of a Creek Dipper, and the live This Moment in Toronto. She's also recorded a series of homespun, mostly acoustic efforts with her husband, former Jayhawks frontman Mark Olson, as the Original Harmony Ridge Creekdippers; the pair also contributed a track to the Gram Parsons tribute disc Return of the Grievous Angel. Williams spent much of spring 2000 opening dates for Lou Reed, in preparation for the release of her sixth solo album, Water to Drink, which mixes Williams originals with covers of jazz tunes, including the title song, penned by legendary Brazilian bossa nova originator Antonio Carlos Jobim. Speaking from her home in the Mojave desert, Williams talked with Barnes & Noble.com's Kerry Dexter about songwriting, her musical influences, and how she's feeling these days.
Barnes & Noble.com: You produced Water to Drink in your home studio?
Victoria Williams: Yes, and I really liked doing that. The equipment is not so bulky anymore, not with computers and all. I love the sound of tape, I really do, but with the right preamps and some old tube stuff to warm up the sound, even digital can sound pretty warm these days. And I felt much more relaxed, singing, because of working at home.
B&N.com: "Water to Drink" is one of the three cover songs on the album. How did you find it?
VW: That was a song I wasn't familiar with. A friend brought it to me and I really liked it, but it was in Portuguese, and I didn't have an interpretation of it. So I found a woman to translate it, and then I made what she'd done into something I could sing, you know? Then later I heard from a fellow who said he had a copyright on the only English version -- but it wasn't anything like the one this woman had translated. But the people at Jobim's camp were happy with what we did. And I think that's a good title, kind of a refreshing thing to think about, "Water to Drink."
B&N.com: You grew up in Louisiana...
VW: Yeah, and I started out playing in bands around Louisiana and Texas, little country stores and dance halls and places like that. We were doing mostly cover tunes. I guess you could call what we were doing folk, with some country, and some Texas music.
B&N.com: How did you end up in California?
VW: I left Louisiana, actually, to get away from an old boyfriend who I just couldn't seem to break up with until I put some miles between us. And then, too, California represented some kind of sense of freedom to me, I suppose. When I first came to California, I had a lot of jobs in addition to doing my music -- I worked as a colorist in a studio, and I did hard labor, like house painting and roofing. I worked in a flower market for a while, too, and in a candy store.
B&N.com: What music did you listen to when you were starting out?
VW: I listened to Joni Mitchell, Simon and Garfunkel, Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt. I listened to Cat Stevens a lot. My big sister had friends who were in bands, and I listened to them, too. They'd show me guitar chords, and that's pretty much how I learned to play guitar, just listening to local people there in Louisiana where I grew up.
B&N.com: What are you listening to now?
VW: Well, looking at what's on the CD player, there's a lot of stuff for Mark's next album -- he's putting together a record that will be out on Hightone. And I love Bob Neuwirth's new album, Havana Midnight, that he made with the Cuban musicians. I think that's great.
B&N.com: What have you been reading lately?
VW: I just finished Tuesdays with Morrie, and I've been reading some Annie Proulx stuff.
B&N.com: How are you feeling these days?
VW: It's been really hot this summer, so that's been making it kind of hard, that's making it hard for me to think! But it's okay. I'm okay. It's a battle sometimes, with the numb feet and the numb hands, but I'm doing okay and I'm really looking forward to touring this fall as the headliner. Being an opening act you don't get to play as much as I like to -- I like to do good old two hour shows, at least. I'll be playing at the Rocky Mountain Folk Festival in August and then at the end of September and in October I'm gonna tour around the country. I'm really looking forward to that.
August 15, 2000
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