Time Ain't Accidental

Chronique

Teaming up with Waxahatchee's Katie Crutchfield for the duo Plains in 2022, Texas singer-songwriter Jess Wiliamson uncovered a sort of alt-country Fleetwood Mac sound. She strips that vibe down to its bare essentials for her latest solo effort, piano pounding like anxiety on "Hunter" as she sings about the minefield of online dating:  "I've been thrown to the wolves and they ate me raw" (though there's still a glimmer of hope, as she resolves, "I'm a hunter for the real thing"). Cover to cover, Time Ain't Accidental is a meditation on modern problems that draws from the ghosts of the pasts—and suggests that Williamson is trapped between times. "I read you Raymond Carver by the pool bar like a lady," she sings on the title track, her Texas twang coming through strong in the vowels of lines like "Forget what they said to me/ It doesn't connect/ To the angel in bed with me/ His face 'tween my legs." The sound is at once classic (shades of Emmylou Harris and Nanci Griffith) but also bears echoes of artists like Laura Marling and, especially, the early solo work of Jenny Lewis. "I'd Come to Your Call" recalls the plaintive drama of Lewis's iconic Rabbit Fur Coat album, bittersweet piano hovering in the shadows as Williamson sings, "I'm kept between the bridle and being built to run." Like Lewis, she questions the underbelly of Los Angeles, her adopted town, on the honky-tonk torch song "Chasing Spirits," sounding slightly desperate but still pure as she looks for a reason to stay. "The difference between us is/ When I sing it I really mean it," Williamson sings, poking at the influencer artifice. "Tobacco Two Step" is slow and spare and tugs at every heart string, its guitar solo as lazy as a spinning ceiling fan from a movie. "Topanga Two Step," meanwhile, tries out an electronica beat and a breezy style. "Something's in the Way" is animated with sax honks, while break-up heartbreaker "A Few Seasons" is so spare as to be barely strummed; any extra instrumentation is unnecessary, as Williamson's emotive, homespun voice does all the heavy lifting. © Shelly Ridenour/Qobuz