Victoria Williams-3 folk-rock CDs (Loose, Swing the Statue; This Moment in Toronto) EAC FLAC

Already in her thirties and having performed for a decade, Victoria Williams with ‘Swing the Statue’ produced her crowning achievement to no audience at the turn of the decade. The orchestration of ‘Happy Come Home’ is largely eliminated, and although the production was never as stark as, say,  ‘The Milk-Eyed Mender’ , the power of Victoria’s beautiful warble – clear but never shrill – is heard better than it would be on any subsequent release. The natural imagery that was a staple of her work is never more beautiful than on the bare, countrified ‘Why Look at the Moon’, which manages to sound totally unique within a familiar genre, whilst ‘Boogieman’ goes even further in its combination of percussive funk with this simple country guitar creating a power whose purity no singer/songwriter of the era rivalled. ‘Clothesline Song’, which contains a snippet of Charles Chaplin’s ‘Swing Little Girl’, is less dramatic but still beautiful.

At first listen, ‘Tarbelly and Featherfoot’ can seem slight to the point of soppy, but with repeated listening all the elements of Victoria’s sound flow into place, whilst ‘On Time’ is a genuine masterpiece with Victoria’s touching, warbling and simple soul groove working seamlessly. ‘Holy Spirit’ is one a of a number of celebrations of her Christian faith heard during Victoria’s career, but it does not succumb to any soppiness: the choral vocals and horns deliver a quiet punch that after a few listens will make a listener come back. ‘Summer of Drugs’ – the most celebrated song here due to Soul Asylum’s cover – turns away from Victoria’s distinctive joy to reveal gothic depths and unusual complexity amidst her piercing whispers. Then, ‘I Can’t Cry Hard Enough’, used after the September 11 terrorist attacks when Victoria retired from recording, continues this trend, only to be followed by arguably Victoria’s greatest song in her hymn to the singing American Robin on ‘Wobbling’, where just piano, cello and pedal steel but reveals the starkest power in nature’s beauty. Victoria’s lyrics are childlike with extremely simple rhythms (“Robin redbreast”/“Sits in the nest”) but reflect deeper truth than many much more complex poetry.

‘Vieux Amis’ is the most conventional country number on ‘Swing the Statue’, but Victoria’s voice and the uptempo joyful atmosphere takes it far, then with ‘Weeds’ Victoria produces perhaps the greatest combination of her Christian and naturalist influences. The lyrics are more complex than ‘Wobbling’ – detailing the sufferings of rural people – but the shivering joy is the same. Closing spiritual ‘Lift Him Up’ shows Victoria’s unique take on a genuine gospel song. The off-kilter guitar and mandolin at the beginning sound off-putting at first but like almost everything here, fits together after a few listens.

All in all, ‘Swing the Statue’ is a unique experience: its down-to-earth, trembling, joyful take on the arty singer/songwriter was very much “against the grain” of “alternative” culture when it was released, yet a quarter of a century later it still shines with genuine power. Along with Mary Margaret O‘Hara’s  Miss America  plus Robin Holcomb’s  Robin Holcomb  and  Rockabye  it stands as a lost treasure of its time. Amazon Review of 'Swing the Statue'