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Williams overcomes adversity for Roxy show, musical career

By Jeff Hilger

The most amazing thing about Victoria Williams is that neither her music nor her voice fit neatly into any definable musical category. In her show Thursday night at the Roxy, she displayed her vast range of styles, from piano ballad to guitar pop, Celtic jig, bayou twang, reverent gospel and numerous others.

Her gift for songwriting enables her to create original melodies coupled with lyrics that either tell vivid stories or paint clear pictures of different aspects of her own life.

How many young songwriters, after releasing only two albums of material, have had a tribute album released featuring the likes of Lou Reed, Pearl Jam, Matthew Sweet, the Waterboys, Michelle Shocked and Maria McKee? The answer: only one, Victoria Williams

Why did so many respected artists tribute a woman virtually unknown? The answer is twofold. First, a few years ago Williams found out that she had multiple sclerosis, a powerfully debilitating disease that degenerates one's central nervous system. As most young musicians have no medical insurance, Williams had no money for medical bills. Those involved with Sweet Relief: A Benefit for Victoria Williams decided to donate their talents to helping their ailing friend.

Secondly, those artists cherished the opportunity to perform her music due to the fact that she writes simply beautiful melodic patterns alongside heartfelt, interesting, powerful, poetic lyrics

The atmosphere at the sold-out Roxy was hopeful and encouraging as Williams took the stage. She opened by talking openly with her audience, very informally and off-the-cuff explaining that she had played last night and would try to play a mostly different set list tonight.

During the concert, she included most of the material from her newest, third album, Loose. The opening track of that disc served as her second number, "Century Plant," a typically catchy Williams' tune that combines a strong melody with a storyline about an 81-year-old plant worker looking back on parts of his life.

From there, her six-piece band, which included a cello and a viola, went into an Irish-folk sounding version of "Frying Pan," a song that sounds like it could've been written by Neil Young.

She followed that with two more of her most powerful creations, "Love," a beautiful pop ballad from her new release, and "Crazy Mary," the Williams song that the largest number of people have heard, due to Pearl Jam's version of it that appeared on the tribute album. The powerful tune tells the story of one of society's forgotten: "She lived in the curve in the road, an old tar paper shack ... sometimes on the way into town we'd say, 'Mama can we stop and give her a ride?' Sometimes we did, but she shook her head and her hands flew from her side, wild eyed crazy Mary."

The two-hour, 15-minute showcase continued with strong material throughout, including several pop standards, yet another genre that interests Williams. These numbers included Gershwin's "Someone to Watch Over Me," and "Smoke Gets in your Eyes." Several of her friends from the audience joined her onstage for duets, including Soul Asylum's Dave Pirner, who co-sang "My Ally," and "Summer of Drugs," the song they recorded for the benefit album.

Toward the middle of the set, she performed "Nature's Way," Spirit's '60s rock tune. While she followed the song with a comment about how human nature destroys the earth's topsoil, she has previously stated that the song touches on nature's way of dealing with her own illness.

The end of the concert brought her two most powerful moments. Another duet on, "I Can't Cry Hard Enough," brought tears to Williams' eyes, as well as those of many in her audience. After several gospel-flavored tunes, she closed with "Holy Spirit," a song that heavily incorporates melody and lyrics from the campfire-closing standard "Kum By Ya," a perfect ending to a powerful showing of the strength of Williams, a songwriter of consistency and grace.

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