You’d think, after being initially blown away by opening track, Hello Miss Lonesome, that Marlon Williams belongs in a different era, that his crooning, passionate voice deserves to ring out from the stages of the Grand Ole Opry and other old-timey stages from the 1950s. But you’d be wrong, because his rollicking, countrified solo debut record is so fucking urgent, it’s right now.
Sure, it doesn’t take much to hear references to stars of yore like Roy Orbison and modern-day equivalents like Justin Townes Earle. But stripped back, without the rambunctious, infectious rhythms of his brilliant band, his vocal is as tender, as pure, as questioning as Antony Hegarty or Jeff Buckley.
Williams tells tales you want to hear in a way that demands your undivided attention. His complex and real storytelling (“I lost my wife in 1989 to a certain kind of undetectable cancer/She left me alone in a seven-bedroom home built upon the bones of fallen soldiers” – Strange Things) belies his years and evokes the musings of Leonard Cohen; as do, at times, the pitch-perfect arrangements of the slower, moodier songs.
Despite only being in his early 20s, Williams has plenty of runs on the board in his native New Zealand (multiple New Zealand Music Awards among them) and draws on every trick in his book to draw every possible emotion from your brain as he takes you on his journey. At times impossibly fun, at others bone-achingly beautiful; Marlon Williams has delivered a gem.
