Product Description

'Master And Everyone' is the third album under the moniker,Bonnie Prince Billy, for the former Palace man, Will Oldham. It follows 2001's, 'Ease Down The Road', and has been described by critics as a cross between the sound of that album and his first "Bonnie" release, 'I See A Darkness'.

Track Listing

1. The Way
2. Ain't You Wealthy, Ain't You Wise?
3. Master and Everyone
4. Wolf Among Wolves
5. Joy and Jubilee
6. Maundering
7. Lessons From What's Poor
8. Even If Love
9. Three Questions
10. Hard Life

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #17577 in Music
• Released on: 2003-01-27
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
A slippery character, Will Oldham. Just when it seems we're beginning to understand his subversive ways with country and folk, he'll evade categorisation once again. So it is with Master and Everyone, the third album Oldham's recorded as Bonnie "Prince" Billy, having spent most of the 90s playing as Palace.

Oldham made his name with a perverse streak, a quavering voice and a taste for storytelling that could be broadly termed hillbilly gothic. Master and Everyone, however, is a steady and intimate affair in which he takes on a more conventionally lovelorn persona. It's hard to say whether this directness equals honesty, given that Oldham's tricksy games with character are a match for those of Dylan at his most duplicitous.

Still, Master and Everyoneis an uncommonly engaging album. The musical settings are as minimal as anything Oldham's tried since 1994's Palace Brothers. But there's a certain warmth and quiet confidence that's new, aided by the presence of various bits of Lambchop (including producer/ambient guitarist Mark Nevers) as Oldham's latest back-up band. And, in spite of Oldham claiming he left off a few songs for fear people would like them too much, "The Way", "Wolf among Wolves" and the title track are among the strongest this curmudgeonly genius has ever released. He's still untrustworthy, still spellbinding. --John Mulvey

Customer Reviews

Master at Work
Writing in his Bonnie Prince Billy guise, Will Oldham's `Master and Everyone' is an album of 10 songs, just over 34 minutes long, but is an object lesson in how less is more.

The songs feature minimal accompaniment to Oldham's own voice and acoustic guitar in the shape of occasional female backing vocals and mellow guitars and strings. All that there really is to concentrate on is the quality of the writing, but what high quality it is.

There are no bad tracks here: each song shines with lyrical maturity and melodic beauty far beyond most of Oldham's peers. It is hard to pick out highlights, but the first five and the final track are truly outstanding. `Master and Everyone' seems so simple; Oldham makes it look so easy which is always the sign of talent at work.

The music here is so mellow, melodic and soothing it is like balm to the ears but there is depth and emotional resonance to the lyrics. To pigeonhole it as alt.country is a shame because such labeling might deny the work a wider audience. To sum up, this is one of the best singer-songwriter albums I have ever heard and is highly recommended.

Cosmic Folk Music
It's difficult to put this album into any existing genre such as folk or alt country. This a beautiful and haunting collection of songs which the unique beauty of Will Oldham's voice gives an other-worldly quality. Unbelievable stuff.

Masterful. Every One.
Will Oldhams most immediate album and maybe his best. Its the one to play first timers. There are no duffers whatsoever and "Hard Life" is as great a song as you could here anywhere. Ever. By Anyone. Period.