For those of you who think Holly Williams has ignored her country brethren and denied her past for too long, think again. Here With Me answers those charges.

Her second album (Mercury Nashville), to be released June 16, is somewhat of a departure from the quiet debut the Nashville singer-songwriter made five years ago with The Ones We Never Knew. But Williams doesn’t apologize for taking this downright down-homey approach.

In fact, Williams believes she never strayed too far off the path she originally paved for herself. “I feel like the songs didn’t really change to me, the production changed,” she said. “I still write about the similar themes, still pretty introspective lyrically; but this time I started using a steel guitar and we do a mandolin on a few things and experiment with the fiddle.”

She said she’s happy to be be working with label head Luke Lewis because he “kind of understands both sides of me and where my passions lie and my influences, so it really wasn’t an overwhelming amount of pressure” to have to make it on country radio with a top 10 hit.

“So I just tried to make it about the music, and not try to think about, ‘Is this guitar too country?’ or clean it up enough to make it more Nashville friendly,” she said.

Initially trying to ease her way out of the giant shadows cast by her father Hank Williams Jr. and grandfather Hank Williams Sr., she still brings folk, rock, gospel and pop sensibilities to Here With Me. But there’s no mistaking the country influence on uptempo songs like “Mama,” a tribute to her mother Becky; “Keep The Change;” and “A Love I Think Will Last.”

A duet in the spirit of “Jackson,” the song made popular by Johnny Cash and June Carter, “A Love I Think Will Last” was co-written and performed with Chris Janson. It’s a finger-snapping tune about finding true love that delivers the loosey-goosey fun missing from her first record.

“Mama,” which Williams said she wrote about four years ago, should be a crowd-pleaser, too, one with a simple and heartwarming message: Mama, you were smiling /
When you could have been crying all night oh / Mama, you made me believe everything was alright / Mama, you never wore your pain too thick / I’d like to thank you for this.

Article Author: Michael Bialas

A newspaper editor and former college football player, Michael Bialas makes sports his business but exploring and reviewing music, movies, TV and other forms of pop culture are among the games he enjoys playing now.
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