Anniversary Cheers – Kelly Willis’ “What I Deserve” celebrates 25 years

25 years on , Kelly Willis re-releases the album that changed her fortunes and people’s view of her music.

In 1999 Kelly Willis released “What I Deserve”, an album initiated by her release from MCA Records after failing in her (and the music company’s) quest for commercial success after three attempts. 25 years later, the album has been re-released in enhanced form (remastered, extra live tracks) as a tribute to the album that allowed her voice to expand, her songwriting to begin to flourish and her choice of music and musicians to reflect more of ‘what she deserved’. This is how the re-release came to be.

Oklahoma-born Willis had one of the great voices in country music, even when she burst upon the scene in her teens – a country twang, a throaty sob when she needed one (‘No Depression’), a voice that crackled like no other and control and phrasing that made it more devastating than ever (‘Rolling Stone’). In time that voice was put to great use over the range of musical roots styles that we call americana, but we are getting ahead of ourselves a bit.

Moving to Austin in the 1980s with her boyfriend (later her first husband) Mas Palermo, she fronted a band called Radio Ranch and her voice soon attracted the attention of the likes of Nanci Griffith, who introduced her to MCA boss, Tony Brown. Brown thought he could mould her to fit the commercial country requirements of Nashville and deliver sales success. He oversaw the release of three albums, using top quality session musicians to frame her distinctive voice (Bernie Leadon, Steuart Smith, Michael Rhodes and Benmont Tench to name just a few). “Well-traveled Love” (1990), “Bang Bang” (1991) and the self-titled “Kelly Willis” in 1993 all had some killer songs on them, all attracted critical acclaim but after the first two failed to set the record-buying public alight, a weak marketing support from her record company and a confusion on public radio as to where she actually fitted into the ‘system’, her independent streak left her record company feeling disappointed and Willis feeling disillusioned. The albums didn’t gel with the public despite a couple of minor hit singles and Willis became disenchanted with the way she was being marketed by her recording company. She was released from her contract in 1994, recorded an EP in a short-lived  A & M relationship, but, becoming increasingly disheartened, decided to take matters into her own hands. With what she felt might be a final tilt at what she regarded as success, Willis decided to record the next album on her own and make music that reflected her as a person: “I felt free to do whatever I wanted, to embrace my own quirky style” she told AUK. She had already experienced the ‘Nashville way’ and did not feel comfortable in it.

The short association with A&M had not proved to be a success but it introduced her to songwriters who were at the time exploring what became known as Americana music – she worked temporarily with Jay Farrar (Son Volt) and Gary Louris (Jayhawks) whose style suited her own, to the extent that three tracks from “What I Deserve” were written in conjunction with Louris, who ‘added some choruses and tweaked a few things’ from the words that Willis wrote. She found a new producer and started recording tracks in San Francisco, but sadly fell out with the producer and returned to Austin with the basic tracks for most of the album already recorded. She met with Dave McNair, who agreed to record, engineer and produce the album and thereabouts came the genius part – she enlisted the help of friend and session guitarist extraordinaire, Mark Spencer, and invited guitarist and songwriter par excellence, Chuck Prophet, for the sessions in Austin. She had met Prophet fortuitously on a train in Norway and he has been a part of every solo album ever since. The twin guitars of Spencer and Prophet swap acoustic and electric alternatively, lending the album its signature sound.

Prophet contributed a great song to the album. ‘Got a Feelin’ For Ya‘ is a co-write with legendary Dan Penn and as Willis describes: “I just loved it and wanted to sing like Chuck. No one can do that but Chuck, though, so I made sure his voice was on the track”

Rykodisc heard the album, liked it and signed Willis, thereafter releasing the album that was more successful than her three MCA albums put together. And it led to Willis finding her writing chops to go with the voice that was significantly more confident than on her earlier albums. As she explained to AUK: “I stopped worrying if they were hit country songs which is very important to the Nashville labels – when I stopped worrying I enjoyed writing more”.

It seems perfectly logical that this album gets the anniversary treatment – A&R man Jeff Rougvie suggested  the full reissue package as Willis was contemplating how to recognise its silver anniversary.   The remastering adds lots of little enhancements, and there is the addition of 5 live versions of tracks from the album, taken from the radio show ‘Mountain Stage’ in 1999 (they feature the late lamented Amy Farris on fiddle and vocals).

Upon original release the album seemed to some as a kind of admonishment to MCA, indeed the title track hints at that and includes the lyrics “What I deserve is comfort for my shaken soul / The water on my hands are tears from long ago  / And my skin lets it in / It’s always been too thin / Since I can’t remember when”. 

The opener ‘Take me Down‘ strikes a similar tone:  “ I don’t believe a word you’re saying / And I know the game you’re playing  / So it’s only just for now  / That I will let you take me down”   Perhaps the influence of co-writer Louris,? His third co-write ‘Happy With That’ has the couplet “It’s no good to lose heart / It’s no good to lose sight / It’s no good to have nowhere to go that feels right”.  Although the lyrics are all said to be Willis’.

The choice of tracks on the album is all Willis,  sharing the co-writes with Louris,  and then John Leventhal on the glorious closing ballad ‘Not long for this world’ and the rockier ‘Fading Fast’. She wrote ‘Talk Like That‘ herself from experiences of her life as ‘an army brat and a child of divorce’.  The choice of other writers’ songs embrace the aforementioned Prophet track, the very talented Damon Bramblett’s jaunty but dark ‘Heaven Bound’, a stunning version of Paul Westerberg’s (The Replacements) ‘They’re Blind’ and a great take on English folky Nick Drake’s ‘Time has told me’.

Two tracks are by her now ex-husband Bruce Robison, her declared favourite songwriter at the time – “I just felt I knew the best way to bring out the best in his songs. So arrogant!”  But quite true. ‘Not forgotten you’ and ‘Wrapped’ are lovely tunes with some fine choruses “Thought I was doing fine / About to get you off my mind  / I see your face and then I’m wrapped / Around your pretty little finger again”

And then there is the scorching Paul Kelly song ‘Cradle of Love’, a highlight in an album of highlights, a fairly direct manifestation of love that Willis did not quite appreciate until she had been singing it live for a few months, and so good that a live version was included in the reissue!

The great thing about this album is that Willis is just being herself, allowing her voice to venture into a more rootsy or more bluesy mood as the song dictates, as in ‘They’re Blind’ – which also seems to reflect Willis’ thoughts on her then recent history: “The demands made upon you / Are hard to live up to  / It’s futile to try and deny / And the things you hold dearly / Are scoffed at and yearly  / Judged once and then tossed aside”.

Special mention should be made of the musicians who backed her; in addition to the aforementioned twin guitars, Michael Ramos played piano and keys, Jon Dee Graham played lap steel, Lloyd Maines pedal steel, Amy Farris fiddle and mandolin, Larry Aberman on drums and Michael Been on bass on the original tracks (with Rafael Guyol and John Ludwick on the Austin sessions).

Whilst they don’t vary muchfrom the original album versions, the live tracks are brilliantly recorded, the band is spot on and Willis’ voice reaches out just that little bit further.

Of course Willis went on to record three more solo albums, with an increasing input of her own material,, three duet albums and a Christmas album with Bruce Robison, while at the same time giving birth to, and raising, four children (which explains the long breaks between releases). In 2022 Willis and Robison announced their pending divorce, and since then she has been part of the traditional old-time country trio Wonder Women of Country (with the equally talented Melissa Carper and Brennen Leigh), whose first EP recording was highly regarded. Willis says she plans to do more ‘with the girls’ while trying for a new solo project.  In the meantime the last word goes to her – “What I Deserve was pivotal for me. I took all I had learned in Nashville, the good and the bad, and said THIS is who I have been trying to become” As another couplet from the title track notes “Well I have done / The best I can  / Oh but what I’ve done / It’s not who I am / And oh what I deserve”

Kelly Willis is  a treasure, with a voice to complement the songs she writes or chooses to record. More, please!