I was first introduced to Will Oldham in 1998, when working at a small independent record store in Iowa City. As it goes with all college towns, there are two points in the year when the students find themselves flailing for money. Having spent all of mom and dad's allocated funding for the semester, they seek local record shops to indulge with a wide variety of used CDs and LPs. While we always saw plenty of crap get tossed over the counter (at the time, it was yet another copy of Dave Matthews Under the Table and Dreaming, or that highly-accliamed first album by J-Lo....oops I'm sorry, back then it was Jennifer Lopez....she had yet to adopt her street title), but in the midst of all the unwanted plastics, there were gems. And oh! were there gems. I found some of my favorite artists among the discarded. There was Swervedriver. There was that June of 44 album. And last but certainly not least, there was the paradoxically uplifting Will Oldham.

Although I was some 4 years late catching on, Palace Brothers' Days in the Wake grew quickly on me. It was raw. It was true. It was every imperfection placed in the perfect place. The cracks of Oldham's voice, the out-of-tune guitar, the simple production; everything that was wrong with the record was instantly right to my ears. This was the pure music of a genuine songwriter, from the stark shades of You Will Miss Me When I Burn to the drunken singalong of Come a Little Dog. Genius in its most complete form. Oldham says in the last track, "I am a cinematographer". That statement could not be more true. He captured every bit of Days in the Wake as if it were an uncut film; scratches, fingerprints, and all.

Since that time, I've had the opportunity to pick up a few of Oldham's recent albums as they came out. A collaboration with Rian Muphy, entitled All Most Heaven; another with Dirty Three guitarist Mick Turner (going my the moniker The Marquis de Tren and Bonny Billy); 2001's Ease Down the Road, going by Bonnie 'Prince' Billy this time.

As many times as Oldham changes names, his music remains true to its aim, and Master and Everyone is no exception. Not nearly as shimmeringly produced as Ease Down the Road, Master and Everyone is almost a return to Oldham's Palace days. Its raw again, most of the tracks are stripped down to Voice and acoustic guitar.

The opening track, The Way is a plea of love, like many of Oldham's more recent tunes. "Winter comes and snow / I can't marry you, you know / Without children to grow / I can't marry you, you know / Love me the way I love you / Love me the way I love you" The sparsely plucked acoustic would even suggest a Nick Drake influence if not coupled with a double-bass and the lush cello of Gary Lee Tussing. Oldham almost whispers the lyrics, as if his plea is something that was never meant to leave his lips. A fine introduction that sets the pace of the album.