Sara Watkins — Young in All the Wrong Ways (July 1, 2016)

  ^{Sara Watkins — Young in All the Wrong Ways (July 1, 2016)}•→   Deváté album Sary Watkins a třetí sólové, na kterém spolupracovalo 40 lidí. V obsazení je asi patnáct hráčů a zpěvaček s věhlasnými jmény, takže to beru jako velkolepou session. Sara postupně získala dobrá umístění v US Folk (#11) a US Heat (#13 a #16) v Billboard Magazínu. Fiddler and singer for Nickel Creek began her solo career after that band’s amicable 2007 breakup. “This is a breakup album with myself...” says Sara Watkins of her third solo record, Young in All the Wrong Ways. Writing and recording these ten intensely soul–baring songs was a means for her to process and mark the last couple years, which have been transformative. “I looked around and realized that in many ways I wasn’t who or where I wanted to be. It’s been a process of letting go and leaving behind patterns and relationships and in some cases how I’ve considered myself. What these songs are documenting is the turmoil you feel when you know something has to change and you’re grappling with what that means. It means you’re losing something and moving forward into the unknown.”
•→   That sense of possibility infuses the songs on Young in All the Wrong Ways with a fierce and flinty resolve, which makes this her most powerful and revealing album to date. In some ways it’s a vivid distillation of the omnivorous folk–pop–bluegrass–indie–everything–else Watkins made with Nickel Creek, yet she makes audacious jumps that push against expectations in unexpected ways. These songs contain some of the heaviest moments of her career, with eruptions of thrumming B3 organ and jagged electric guitar. But it’s also quiet, vulnerable, tenderhearted. In other words, bold in all the right ways.Location: Vista ~ Los Angeles, California, USA
Birthname: Sara Ullrika Watkins
Nationality: American
Born: Jun 8 1981
Instruments: Fiddle, ukulele, guitar
Album release: July 1, 2016
Record Label: New West Records
Duration:      41:21 
Tracks:
01 Young In All the Wrong Ways     4:18  
02 The Love That Got Away     3:17  
03 One Last Time     3:08  
04 Move Me     5:47  
05 Like New Year’s Day     4:56  
06 Say So     4:08  
07 Without a Word     3:59  
08 The Truth Won’t Set Us Free     3:32  
09 Invisible     5:21  
10 Tenderhearted     2:55                                                                                             Written by:
≡   Sara Watkins     1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10
≡  Jon Foreman / Sara Watkins     3
≡  Sara Watkins / Dan Wilson     5
≡  Sara Watkins / Gabe Witcher     7                                                                         Credits:
≡   Jay Bellerose Drums, Percussion
≡   Maarten de Boer Photography
≡   Jon Brion 6–String Electric Bass, Celeste, Guitar (Electric), Mellotron, Piano
≡   Kim Buie A&R
≡   Brandon Cervantes French Horn
≡   Tyler Chester Hammond B3, Mellotron, Organ, Wurlitzer
≡   Mikaela Davis Harp
≡   Richard Dodd Cello
≡   Chris Eldridge Guitar (Acoustic)
≡   Mary Faber Vocal Harmony
≡   Jon Foreman Composer
≡   Shani Gandhi Engineer
≡   Gordon Hammond Engineer
≡   Mary Hooper Design
≡   Jim James Vocal Harmony
≡   Sarah Jarosz Vocal Harmony
≡   Rouble Kapoor Assistant Engineer
≡   Kylie Kempster Vocal Harmony
≡   Paul Kowert Double Bass
≡   Gavin Lurssen Mastering
≡   Amanda Miller Assistant Engineer
≡   Scott Moore Assistant Engineer
≡   Aoife O’Donovan Vocal Harmony
≡   Russ Pahl Pedal Steel
≡   Tom Peterson Clarinet (Bass), Flute (Alto), Sax (Baritone)
≡   Mike Piersante Engineer, Mixing
≡   Noam Pikelny Guitar (Electric)
≡   Chris Rondinella Assistant Engineer
≡   Dave Sinko Engineer
≡   Andy Taub Assistant Engineer
≡   Benmont Tench Hammond B3, Piano, Wurlitzer
≡   Sara Watkins Arranger, Composer, Fiddle, Guitar (Rhythm), Lead, Ukulele, Vocal Harmony, Vocals
≡   Sean Watkins Guitar (Acoustic)
≡   Dan Wilson Composer
≡   Gabe Witcher Arranger, Bass Harmonica, Composer, Engineer, Fender Jazz Bass, Fiddle, Guitar (12 String Acoustic), Guitar (12 String Electric), Guitar (Electric), Guitar (Rhythm), Loops, Orchestral Arrangements, Producer, String Arrangements, Viola, Violin © Sara Watkins Watkins performing at the Austin City Limits Music Festival 2009, Austin Texas, October 2, 2009. Sara Ullrika Watkins (born June 8, 1981) is an American singer–songwriter and fiddler. Watkins debuted in 1999 as the fiddler of the progressive bluegrass group, Nickel Creek. The Austin City Limits Music Festival is an annual three-day music festival in Austin, Texas’ Zilker Park.
Editorial Reviews
•→   Young In All The Wrong Ways is Sara Watkins’ most cohesive and fully realized solo album. The new collection finds her embracing the role of frontwoman following the collaborations of Watkins Family Hour (featuring Sean Watkins, Fiona Apple and Benmont Tench) and Nickel Creek, the hugely successful group she first formed with her brother Sean and Chris Thile. The album is also her most powerful. Personal and revealing, she wrote or co–wrote each of the 10 songs–a first for her. It was produced in Los Angeles by Gabe Witcher who arranged a stellar band including two of his fellow Punch Brothers, guitarist Chris Eldridge and bass player Paul Kowert, and additional musicians Jon Brion and Jay Bellerose. Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O’Donovan, Watkins’ bandmates in I’m With Her, provide harmonies on the title track while Jim James of My Morning Jacket guests on “One Last Time.” Benmont Tench is again featured on keys. Sara calls the record “a breakup album with myself...” Writing and recording these ten intensely soul–baring songs was a mechanism to process and mark the last few transformative years. The record is about Sara turning the page and taking the reins of her own life, in both a career and personal sense. “I looked around and realized that in many ways I wasn’t who or where I wanted to be,” Sara says. •→   “It’s been a process of letting go and leaving behind patterns and relationships and in some cases how I’ve considered myself. What these songs are documenting is the turmoil you feel when you know something has to change and you’re grappling with what that means. It means you’re losing something and moving forward into the unknown.” The songs contain some of the heaviest moments of her career, with eruptions of thrumming B3 organ and jagged electric guitar. But it’s also quiet, vulnerable, tenderhearted. Bold in all the right ways. Young in All the Wrong Ways reveals an artist who has managed to transform her own turmoil into music that is beautiful and deeply moving: “God bless the tenderhearted,” she sings, “who let life overflow.”REVIEW
BY JOHN PAUL, 1 July 2016;  SCORE: 7
•→   …Sara Watkins wastes no time in letting people know that her latest album, Young in All the Wrong Ways is a post–breakup, post–label shakeup, identity crisis in the making.
•→   From the opening title track’s surging, aggressive chorus vocals through to the delicate, almost defeated moments of a song like “Invisible,” Young finds Watkins searching for a voice that best represents where she is now. That she’s able to run through so many stylistic iterations comes as little surprise, given the genre–hopping of Nickel Creek and her own solo work. But in attempting to establish a new direction, a new voice for herself, she seems at a loss as to who she really is.
•→   It’s not that these songs are bad by any means. In fact, Young is a stellar collection of songs ranging in emotion from rage to sadness to defeat to contentedness, all impeccably produced and performed. Rather there’s simply so many different musical ideas and identities going on that it too often plays more like someone casually scanning the radio dial than a cohesive artistic statement. Without question Watkins is an impressive vocalist and songwriter, something she displays with aplomb throughout the album. But her overly eager attempt to show off everything of which she is capable ultimately ends up detrimental to the album as a whole, confusing the overall tonality and subsequently coming off as the transitional album that it truly is.                                                          © Photo credit: Maarten Deboer
•→   Yet it’s hard to fault someone this emotionally vulnerable and open. On the title track, she takes her former flame to task, plainly stating, “I’ve got no time to look back / So I’m going to leave you here” and “You were my future but that’s in the past / You’ll get another and it might last.” Similarly, the plaintive ballad “The Love That Got Away” features lines like, “If you live long enough / You start to think about a list of / What you would do differently” and, on “The Truth Won’t Set Us Free”, “I believe that he believes / Every word that he’s been saying.” Taken out of context, these lyrics appear as though cribbed from a jilted teen’s diary. But when wrapped in Watkins’ impressive musicality and nuanced performance throughout, the occasional triteness of the sentiments being expressed manage to transcend their lyrical simplicity and become something far more affecting.
•→   And from that standpoint, Young is an accomplished work of an artist in transition. While thematically of a piece, the front half of the album relies on too great a stylistic juxtaposition to be successful. Fortunately, Watkins seems to find her footing on the album’s back half, delivering a solid set of songs that flow seamlessly from one to the next. In this, Young plays out almost as a real–time documentation of the post–breakup rollercoaster of emotions. You can almost feel the ebb and flow of anger and frustration giving way to sadness and longing before finally resolving to take matters into her own hands and simply move on.•→   “Say So”, a track that functions as something of a demarcation point between sides, is a powerfully emotional performance that sits right in Watkins’ stylistic sweet spot, mixing hints of Americana with knowing singer–songwriter pathos. It’s one of several musical high points that helps to lift the album above its own personal identity crisis, touching on where she’s been and where should could potentially find herself once the dust settles.
•→   In the meantime, Young in All the Wrong Ways is a frustratingly complex set of simple emotional sentiments render in an array of styles that finds its creator struggling to come to terms with where she is personally, professionally and, most importantly, emotionally. In that, Watkins succeeds in creating a modern–day breakup album that feels more like a true emotional catharsis than calculated cash–in. And for that, we can all be thankful.
•→   ON HER THIRD SOLO RELEASE, SARA WATKINS STRUGGLES TO FIND A TRUE SENSE OF SELF FOLLOWING THE END OF A RELATIONSHIP, RESULTING IN A MULTI–LEVEL TRANSITIONAL EXERCISE IN SOUL–BARING AND GENRE–HOPPING. •→   http://www.popmatters.com/  //  Website: http://www.sarawatkins.com/
Bandcamp: https://sarawatkins.bandcamp.com/album/young-in-all-the-wrong-ways•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•→•

Sara Watkins — Young in All the Wrong Ways (July 1, 2016)

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