Hello Sorrow Hello Joy

Description

Three Queens in Mourning first gathered in summit to sing celebration of the publication of Will Oldhams book of collected lyrics, Songs of Love and Horror. Alasdair Roberts (Appendix Out), Jill O Sullivan (Jill Lorean), and Alex Neilson (Trembling Bells, Alex Rex) each arrived provisioned with a small armful of selections nearest and dearest from Bonnie Prince Oldhams far-reaching catalogue. Three Queens in Mournings takes on these tunes follow naturally from the fit between Wills words and their threedistinctive voices. Alasdair Roberts sweet, guileless delivery of Christmas Time in the Mountains amplifiesthe lacerating quality of the lyric we need an enemy / Im saving all my rage for you; even if at the outset of the song were told that time is the enemy, the abiding sentimentthe red-hot word that organizes my memory of the songis rage. Alis and Jills trading of verses on New Partner puts a different spin on what had previously registered as an especially mercurial first-person narrative voice, one that swoops between tenderness (lay back, rest your head on my thighs) and ecstatic self-absorption (breaking it to the ex to whom the song is addressed that Ive got a new partner riding with me). Add Alexs voice, not only for his madcap Lost Blues, but as part of the choir on Ohio River Boat Song (a song with origins in the traditional Loch Tay Boat Song), and these three Scottish accents singing about the muddy Ohio, Smoketown, Oldham County, and Floyds Knobs, I mean, theres not much else this Kentuckianthese are all deeply familiar landmarkscan say.

Type through tears. On this back to back records, The Bonnie Prince Billy LP is a collection of three cover versions from Ali, Jill and Alex directory and one original track. Three Queens in Mourning / Bonnie Prince Billy is a collaboration between Will Oldham (Bonnie Prince Billy), Alasdair Roberts (Appendix out / Drag City), Jill O Sullivan (Jill Lorean) and Alex Neilson (Trembling Bells, Alex Rex) Sleeve notes by David Grubbs