Buzzin Music

Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy – Beware – album review

Bonnie 'Prince Billy: Beware

Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy has been producing albums at quite some rate since the influential I See A Darkness in 1999, thereby edging slowly open the door to critical disdain and reducing the sense of anticipation that greets him with each new release. This probably peaked sometime after the release of the superlative The Letting Go, on which a cleaner, more refined sound replaced the rock leanings of Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s folk-based songs.

Yet, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy is not one who cares for self-promotion. On his new album, Beware, his obliviousness to what people expect from him is highly evident. He breaks little ground sonically, nor does he particularly open one’s eyes to conventional music-making, yet there remains something indefinably essential about Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s music that makes it impossible to ignore him. Beware, at times, is on a par with his best work.

This much more conventional American country/folk album indulges in a bigger and tighter production than previously. Beware is littered with country guitar lines, folk fiddle parts and even a bizarre moment where you think Bonnie’s gone Peruvian or something with an airy flute playing over some tribal bongo (‘Afraid Ain’t Me‘). But through these strange and occasionally cheesy sounds comes Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s enrapturing voice and the lyrics that are both weird and oddly touching (“Sometimes you like the way I smell / or how my stomach jiggles / but you don’t love me”).

The big songs, then, such as ‘Beware Your Only Friend’ are pulled off with some skill, but the lack of invention requires a little more work for listeners to get their teeth into them. Stil, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy is undoubtedly most affecting when the veil of a full band are stripped away or backgrounded – the soft folk of ‘Death Final’ and the free-time ‘There Is Something I Have To Say’ show that.

Time and again Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy rewards those who listen attentively to his albums. The juxtaposition of styles and of lyrics with expectations is intelligent stuff. ‘You Don’t Love Me’, for example, is not a break-up song or wallowing in self-pity as one would imagine, but rather a perky song about the difference between love and mild infatuation. And it’s all treated with a wry tinge of humour, which makes me wonder if a lot of the nods to clichéd musical genres aren’t doing something similar, breaking down expectations of music in the modern context.

Beware features guest appearances by numerous musicians (list provided upon request), proving, if it was needed, the respect that Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy commands.

Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy will be on tour simultaneous with the release of Beware, which is out now on Domino Records. Watch this space for a review of his show at the Royal Festival Hall in April.