Kelly Willis Albums (7)
'Translated from Love'
Release Date 1/1/2007
Tracks 12
Label Ryko/Wea
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
Translated from Love is Kelly Willis' seventh album and her first (aside from a Christmas set in 2006) in five years. It was produced by Chuck Prophet with a small group of musicians that rotates a bit but is more or less a unit: Prophet, Greg Leisz, Marc Pisapia, John Ludwick, and Michael Ramos. Guests include Willis' husband Bruce Robison, the Tosca String Quartet, and Jules Shear (who wrote or co-wrote a couple of tunes here). Prophet, Willis and Shear take on the lion's share of writing credits here, often in combinations. Willis is the darling of alt country fans and NPR listeners, and each recording has received more platitudes than the one before. It will be interesting to see what they make of Translated. This is, in many ways, as slick as her MCA records, though it is punchier, rocks a little harder, and feels like it was geared for more open-minded country radio stations. The music is full of keyboards featured as prominently as guitars, tight arrangements, clipped harmonies, and bona fide rock riffs in places; what's more, the tracks accent the jumpier side of Willis' voice. Think Carlene Carter's 1980 album Musical Shapes (produced by Nick Lowe) (and yeah, it is a good thing). Alt country, Americana or, as some are now calling it, "Ameripolitan" has become a ghetto of generic artists, sounds, and utterly forgettable songs that rely more on lyrical imagery than on their crafted melodies to get them across. Willis, who has played this game her way since leaving MCA in the '90s, knows what she's doing. Prophet's a perfect producer for getting what an artist wants out of a tune. "Nobody Wants to Go to the Moon Anymore" opens the set with its jaunty, popping 21st century rockabilly. It's got a shuffling, crisp blend of acoustic and electric guitars, and solid snare pop driving the thing. "Don't Know Why," with its Wurlitzer and B-3, carries a kind of '80s roots country feel: it's got a solid, hooky melody in a beautiful mid-tempo pop-love song written by Willis, Prophet and Shear. If there is any questions about the early rock & roll influence on this disc, go no further than "Teddy Boys," with its modified Chuck Berry lick. It's modified by Ramos playing a big fat Moog as part of the melody line. There are those young and middle-aged men (many of them critics who are projecting their own fantasies) who will write all these songs off as sell-outs, as "merely" recordings by female artists, unless their titles are drenched in a slavish vulnerability they perceive as "honesty." Willis offers a twist on these themes in "Losing You," with its banjo lines featured prominently, the tempo in the middle, and her expressive Virginia drawl drenched in strings and pedal steel. "Too Much to Lose" puts Robison's vocals in the mix, and is also laden with strings. It's a slow, simple tune, but Willis sings with great authority. The longing in her voice and in her lyrics never sacrificess her dignity. The '60s rock harmonies that introduce "The More That I'm Around You" are offset by the cheesy synth lines. This is one of Shear's great pop songs and Willis does it justice, as does Leisz's Rickencbacker 12-string. The great cover of David Bowie's "Success" is simply a riot. It's all loose and ranging, driven by Ramos playing a Vox Continental organ and shouted backing vocals by the Gourds. There's a stolid country ballad in "Stone's Throw Away," a gorgeous song that plays more to Willis' recognizable past (so it may be big with the males mentioned above). The big fat rock & roll guitars in "I Must Be Lucky" accented by dobro and organ, make it one of the best cuts on the set, before the album's taken out by the minimally dressed acoustic title track with the sweet tinges of Shear's backing vocal and Ramos' accordion. In all, it's a winner, a solid, consistently crafted "new country" record that wears rock & roll proudly on its sleeve. And don't be surprised if the contemporary country stations or CMT and GAC pick up on it. ~ Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Kelly Willis and her spouse Bruce Robison both have a knack for writing simple, emotionally straightforward country tunes, and they know how to make them work in the studio with plenty of heart and soul and a low level of extraneous fluff. So it's good to see them release a collaborative album at last, even if it's a modest Christmas-themed effort, and Happy Holidays finds the couple in fine form together. Dominated by covers (Robison contributes the album's sole original, "Oklahoma Christmas," which sounds like a more concise and less snarky variation on Robert Earl Keen's "Merry Christmas from the Family"), Happy Holidays moves back and forth between seasonal torch songs (Willis sounds sexy indeed on "Santa Baby," and she and Robison are both playful and sensuous on "Baby, It's Cold Outside"), somber but celebratory numbers such as "In the Bleak Midwinter" and "A Winter's Tale" (delivered respectively by Willis and Robison with feeling and dignity), and twangy Yuletide tunes, such as Charlie Louvin's "Shut in at Christmas," Buck Owens' "Santa Looked a Lot Like Daddy," and the tongue-in-cheek "Please Daddy Don't Get Drunk." While the production and arrangements are elegant and concise, this hardly sounds like a tossed-together Christmas quickie, with the headliners and their backing musicians presenting these songs with care and affection, and if this isn't the twang-tastic holiday disc some might have expected, it delivers equal portions of taste, passion and great music, and anyone with an ear for either Willis or Robison will want to have this on hand for their tree-trimming party. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Austin, TX, sure has it good -- a lot of amazing musicians are calling it home: Shawn Colvin, Patty Griffin, and the Dixie Chicks, to name a few. Add Kelly Willis to the list, because with Easy she has earned, or at least kept, her place in amazing-ville. Funny thing is, Willis is almost the perfect synthesis of the above-mentioned artists. She has a tender, romantic way in her songcrafting not at all unlike Colvin. Her voice has an rich, expressive ache, as does Griffin's. And she incorporates the best of country and bluegrass music into her own sonic foundry à la the Dixie Chicks (it certainly doesn't hurt much that she and Dixie Chick Emily Robison are sisters-in-law via the Robison brothers, Bruce and Charlie). With Easy, Willis offers up a half-dozen original compositions and a few very tasteful covers that are, well, easy -- easy on the ear, easy on the heart, easy on the mind. She's one of those gals who can say she was country when country wasn't cool, if only for her dignified and much-appreciated adherence to a real, organic, rooted sound that's as much Americana as anything else. This framework suits her well. The record would have been great without them, but it should also be noted that some very talented folks contributed a little something along the way. Alison Krauss, Chris Thile, Vince Gill, Dan Tyminski, and Ian McLagan all get a tip of the hat on this one, too. ~ Kelly McCartney, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
ThIs effort from country singer Kelly Willis has a number of important things going for it. First of all, there's her voice, which is an almost archetypally perfect blend of sweetness and grit. Then there are her backing musicians -- in particular guitarist Mark Spencer, who makes a recognizably country sound without overdoing it or descending into bathos and stereotype. Last, and very importantly, there's producer Dave McNair, who has crafted a beautifully balanced and full-bodied sound for the album without allowing things to get too slick and prettified. What's lacking, for the most part, are melodies strong enough to grab your interest and hold it. There are some hooks -- "Take Me Down" is quite singable, and there's a great version of Nick Drake's "Time Has Told Me" -- but they're relatively few and far between, and scarcity of hooks can be death for a country album. In this case the lack is far from fatal, but it's noticeable. Recommended with reservations. ~ Rick Anderson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
You just have to feel bad for Kelly Willis. Gorgeous and rambunctious, with a voice featuring both traits in equal measure, Willis spent the early '90s issuing well-appointed country-rock collections that went curiously, damnably unnoticed. 1993's eponymous effort was no different. Produced by Don Was, the album accessed the same smart sound that made Dwight Yoakam a star, but all it did for Willis was get her dropped from MCA. Fortunately, by decade's end, persistence, patience, and a streak of good old stubborn pride had helped land her a new deal with Ryko, and a good bit of the attention she'd always deserved. Willis presaged all of this with one of the slower burning tracks on the 1993 release. "There's so much to take for granted when life is going well," she sings on "I Know Better Now." "When the tides will turn no one can tell." The song's touches of mandolin and warm Hammond organ are typical of the album's sound, which is just as comfortable with the raggedy guitar and hoochie coo of "Take It All Out on You" as it is with the wistful, mature pop of "Get Real" (a song that helped write the sonic blueprint for the later crossover success of Faith Hill.) Willis' vocal style is like granules of sand in a clear mountain stream, or a torn T-shirt in the back row of church -- as pretty as it can be, her voice never quite loses the signature of her youthful turn as a barroom belter. In retrospect, it's nearly impossible to see how Kelly Willis wasn't a success. But she seemed to take it all in stride. Her sighing duet with Kevin Welch on his "That'll Be Me" applies well to the two singers' country outsider status. "You and I were gypsies born under the same sign," Welch croons over a dusty pedal steel guitar. But by the time Willis joins him on the title line, you've stopped feeling bad for Willis' run of fool's gold and started seeing a diamond in the rough. ~ Johnny Loftus, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Willis's idea of country comes from female rockabillys like Janis Martin and Wanda Jackson and from the blues-influenced Texas crowd she runs with in Austin. Bang Bang reflects that influence in the blistering tempos of "Too Much to Ask" and "Standing by the River," the Tex-Mex groove of "The Heart That Love Forgot," and an absolutely incendiary version of Joe Ely's "Settle for Love." ~ Brian Mansfield, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
On her debut, this Austin country-rocker sings Texas-steel tunes and roisterous rockers with spirited assurance, but there's a natural tremble in her voice that makes her sound dangerous yet vulnerable. Willis is one of the few country singers with the disarming beauty to become a true sex symbol, and if she's the feminine response to all the hat acts, that's fine. ~ Brian Mansfield, All Music Guide
