49. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - The Letting Go (2006)

The Letting Go was recorded, like Hex Enduction Hour before it in Iceland. Perhaps because of the remote location, the album has a consistent ensemble sound and feeling about it, unique in the Oldham catalogue. Travelling to Iceland with Dawn McCarthy from Fawn Fables, along with regular collaborators brother Ned Oldham, Jim White and Nico Muhly, Will embarked upon the most traditional promotional tour and press campaign of his career to date, including a bizarre appearance in a R Kelly's Trapped in the closet soul opera.


McCarthy's vibrato less folk backing vocals, and the addition of classical strings and flugelhorn, add a folk ballad, Grimm's fairy tales vibe to the album, which Oldham accentuates by including ballads about kids disappearing into the snow and the chaos of nature, in Then the letting go. Along with Oldhams familiar themes of the urge to misbehavior, and sexual desire against a belief in love and righteousness. Themes which perhaps explain his love of soul artists like R Kelly and Prince.



The title comes from a poem about the feeling of freezing to death in snow -
This is the hour of lead - Remembered, if outlived, As freezing persons, recollect the snow - First chill - then stupor - then the letting go.



Fear of commitment always features in Oldham's music, in Cursed Sleep Bonnie lies next to a woman who traps him in his dreams of wild love, yet the reality is much more mundane.

 

The Seedling is the strangest song on the set, embracing dissonance and sounding like the uptempo numbers from I see a darkness. The chorus again speaks of split personalities, 'Birdies say I got no children, birdies never know, in my hidden life I've made a seedling grow'.



Lay and Love is the closest Bonnie gets to a straight love song, but still the second verse admits that the mistrust he sees behind that radiant smile attracts him all the more.



Bonnie's ability to address the carnal desires of man, in an poetic and open hearted way, ensure he remains one of the most interesting artists out there, his new releases remain worth checking out, and always contain a few gems. As Bonnie sings 'I have tended to god's small song and to love's small song'.