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Little Honey

by Lucinda Williams

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Lucinda Williams does anguish and despondency so well it's easy to forget that Happy Woman Blues is not just the title of her 1980 album, but also the way she thinks of herself and her music. That identity comes across with full force in Little Honey, the follow-up to 2007's beautiful, yet heavily brooding West. Here, a full-throated Williams revels in the rejuvenation of her engagement to her manager/co-producer Tom Overby, over whom she's positively giddy on the declarative first song, "Real Love." Her newfound bliss seems to open the floodgates to a musical revival, since Little Honey ranks as one of her most diverse efforts, ranging from pounding rock 'n' roll (the raw sex of the title track) to the Hank Williams-ish country blues of "Well, Well, Well," to "Tears of Joy" and "Knowing"'s '60s soul. Some of the finest writing appears on "Rarity," a loving, but devastating tribute to a fellow artist, and "Plan to Marry," as thoughtful a meditation on love as any time-honored sonnet. Just when Williams seems to have run the gamut, she pulls out a Stones-y (via Louisiana) cover of AC/DC's "It’s a Long Way to the Top" as the punctuation mark to the set. -– Alanna Nash