Search - Bonnie Prince Billy :: Summer in the Southeast

Do Not Hesitate-Bonnie & Co. are in top form!

C. J. Mateer | Brooklyn, NY USA | 11/20/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I gotta say-having seen Will Oldham a.k.a. Bonnie 'Prince' live before: this cd really captures all of the reworkings and looseness of the live shows. Almost every tune is reworked either arrangement wise or vocally-which makes this even more of a uniquely captivating listen. Lots of yelps and howls ("Wolf among Wolves" and "Ease Down The Road"), sped up and rollicking versions of some of Will's softest tunes ("Master and Everyone" & "May It Always Be"), a completely silenced room hanging on every word and note ("I See A Darkness" and "Beast for Thee"), and the band displaying their dynamic rawkness ("Madeleine Mary") just to name a few. It's a great mix between the newer material and the classics with all of Bonnie's cohorts in tow doing what they do. This is right up there with the energy, looseness, and sincerity of the classic Viva Last Blues in my opinion. Maybe not the best place to start your Will Oldham collection (I'd recommend Viva Last Blues & I See A Darkness and take it from there). Highly-Highly recommended for any of Bonnie's already devoted followers."

Bonnie Prince Billy on Steroids

J.Rouatt | Toronto, Canada | 01/27/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This album is great on so many levels. Will is in fine form, delivering a heart wrenching performance and the band is spot on while still retaining a ruggedness which gives the songs character. Also, the songs are beefed up to full out hard rock mode which approaches the most ragged Neil Young or (dare I say) Pearl Jam. Tracks from the album 'Master and Everyone' benifit from this reworking, giving them a force and power that was perhaps lacking on that record. Recorded prior to the release of 'Super Wolf' you can hear the germs of that album here as 'Summer in the South East' prominently features Oldham collabrator Matt Sweeney and his more rock oriented guitar playing. The recording itself reveals what sounds like a very intimate affair with audience interaction and between song banter. Tack on another half star to give this an overall rating of 4.5"

Ease on Down the C21st

R. J MOSS | Alice Springs, Australia | 05/24/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"With due respect to both artists,'Summer in the South-East', evokes the moral gravity of Kurt Cobain's,'Unplugged' session. It's an uncanny presence and something to do with their respective intensity; that a certain visual and tonal depth is shaped by pain and the questions arising from it. This would be unbearable, and far from the visceral pleasure of the music, if it were the full story. Its compelling intimacy, in part, derives from its rough impurities. Even the counter harmonies are delightfully skewered to add to Oldham's 'darkness'. Affecting a phraseology that would sit comfortably in the mid C19th while probing his inner state with existential concision, he's fashioned a folk vision for our times, which, in this setting, rocks out. The selection is a virtual encapsulation of Oldham's 'greatest hits', and for this listener, they read as an emotive landscape of terror and beauty. The set has a sweetly balanced feel, raking the best versions from several performances to deliver the graceful contrasts of expanded and contracted space, speed and colour. You get a whiff of Neil Young and Jim Morrison in here, but Oldham is a total and welcome original to the fin de siecle. I've rarely been moved this way, though I do remember the first occasion when the tubercular rasping of Dylan's voice whopped me from behind in '65, and the world seemed to shift a few important degrees."