Bill Jones, Two Year Winter (Compass, 2003)
If you've heard Bill Jones' previous albums (Panchpuran and Turn to Me, reviewed by Peter Massey), you know roughly what to expect from Two Year Winter: a lovely alto singing mostly English traditional songs (many about strong women engaged in the war of the sexes), backed by very-well-played instruments. Jones' strength is the clarity and beauty with which she (yes, Bill is female) interprets songs and sets them to simple, unaffected arrangements. It all sounds effortless, whether the songs are bouncy or mournful.
I don't like this album as well as Panchpuran, largely because I dislike music that wallows in angst -- even if the misery is as lovely and atmospheric as it is here. Two Year Winter, the title tune, is beautifully written and utterly depressing. The words by American songwriter Anne Hill ("the snowy brown hills look like pintos backs/Running away down a lonely track" and "the ice-blocked rivers break and flow/As I breath in the last breath of snow/Weep like willows for all my friends") sound fit for a suicidal high-plains cowboy, rather than an English singer. Anne Hills also penned the words to "Lost Chances," which is about as cheerful as it sounds.
Luckily, the trio of traditional "Night-time Jigs" that follows slowly picks up both the pace and the mood, with Jones on whistle and accordion, David Wood on guitar, Sara Wright on flute and Shanti Paul Jayasinha on cello.
Not that I'm against all sad songs. "The Two Brothers," by Pete Morton, is by far the best song here. It is heart-breaking without wallowing, and Jones' voice and piano are well-suited to this plea for peace.
And "Hey Away" sounds like a mellow, cheerful lullaby, but grows morally complicated. A wife and mother sings to her baby son and about how she'll enjoy the return of her Johnny tomorrow. All light and happy, even bland, lyrics -- until the verse, "When daddy gets drunk he will take up a knife/And shout and he'll threaten that he'll take my life/Who would not be a keelman's wife/To have a man like Johnny." Then, the dark underbelly is seemingly forgotten in the chorus and last verse. I enjoy this sort of ambiguous ending.
The ambiguity in "The Song of Our Darling Grace" doesn't work as well. Jones wrote the words, recounting a version (more historical than many) of the life and death of Grace Darling. Jones sets the story of the Victorian lighthouse-keeper's daughter, heroine, and exploited celebrity over a traditional Irish tune. If Jones has a particular viewpoint on the story, it's too obscure for me to discern.
Other traditional numbers include "The Holland Mistress," an upbeat tune with lyrics about a widow who frames her servant for stealing after he scorns her offer of marriage. It's bookended by "Bide," in which a blacksmith pursues the scornful woman until he wins her and "lays her pride." In addition, the album includes "The Haymakers," "The Lover's Ghost" (about doomed love, with lovely mellow flugelhorn by Shanti Paul Jayasinha) and "The Diddling Set," which is lively and funny and one of my favorites on this album.
Two Year Winter includes a second disk, Jones' four-song EP, Bits and Pieces (although it isn't listed as being a two-disk package in the liner notes or on her Web site). The fiddling on the cheery "Riddles of the North" was so marvelous that I immediately reached for the playlist -- Kathryn Tickell plays on this track. Also, "What Am I Bid?" is another outstanding song, seemingly written for Jones' voice. The song was written by Brian Bedford, the engineer for this album.
Although the album isn't all to my taste, the poetry of the lyrics and the understated instrumentals throughout are gorgeous.
Bill Jones has a Web site here. The Compass Records Web site is here.
