LIVE REVIEW: Lucinda Williams in Shelburne, VT (07.11.25)
It was not quite sunset as multicolored lawn chairs and picnic blankets peppered the grassy slope of the Shelburne Museum lawn. Even from the back of the field, where shrieking children chased after each other and food lines snaked into a maze, the stage towered over the colorful sea of concertgoers. With its staggering column of black speakers and steel rigging, it stood in industrial contrast to the leafy trees and green mountains that rose behind it, washed warm by the evening light. At the center of the stage stood Lucinda Williams, opening for Father John Misty. The acclaimed singer-songwriter was a splash of blue denim against the all-black attire of her band and the stage’s dark backdrop.
The Louisiana-born musician has blended the sounds of country, rock, folk, and blues since the inception of her career in the late 1970s. Her music is gritty and vulnerable, steeped in Americana influences and aesthetics. Williams performed on the Shelburne Museum stage alongside drummer Brady Blade, bassist David Sutton, guitarist Marc Ford, and multi-instrumentalist (guitar, pedal steel, harmonica) Doug Pettibone.
She opened her set with the nostalgic rock number “Let’s Get the Band Back Together” from her most recent album, Stories from a Rock N Roll Heart. This sense of nostalgia would thread through the performance, memories bittersweet. The band came in strong, guitar humming over the muddy thump of the drums, the gravel in Williams’ voice meeting their sound with equal force. The song cut through the July evening heat, reverberating through the audience like a heartbeat.
Williams’ performance uniquely focused on paying homage to the accomplishments and lives of other artists. “This song is in memory of Tom Petty,” she introduced “Stolen Moments,” a heartfelt tribute to her friendship with the musician, written in response to his death. Emotion thickened in the wail of the guitar and in her voice, amplified by harmonies. She continued this memorializing with “Drunken Angel,” about the tragic life and death of Texas singer-songwriter Blaze Foley. Of the two, this song hit harder. “He was a bit of a hellraiser and troublemaker,” recalled Williams before warbling the heartwrenching lines: “Why’d you let go of your guitar/ Why’d you ever let it go that far/ Drunken Angel.”
This sense of reflection was echoed by “Fruits of My Labor.” The opening track of her 2003 album, A World Without Tears, was already retrospective when it came out, opulent with sensory descriptions of ephemeral moments. “I been tryin’ to enjoy/ All the fruits of my labor” she croons on the track. More than twenty years later, these lines held even more significance and wisdom as Williams sang them. She transformed the song into both an anthem to who she is today and a celebration of who she was then, changing certain melodic rhythms to drive home a lyric’s meaning. The line “Baby, sweet baby, if it’s all the same/ Take the glory any day over the fame” feels heavy with romantic longing on the recording. But in this performance, she syncopated it slightly, and it took on a conversational tone. She directed these words of advice towards her audience, but I think she was also singing to the person she was when she wrote the song.
The second half of Williams’ set was dominated by covers. “This is somebody else’s song,” she announced before commencing her rendition of Bob Marley and the Wailers’ “So Much Trouble in the World,” the breaks in her voice complementing the reggae groove. Then came a seismic shift in energy as the band went electric for a rock version of Memphis Minnie’s “You Can’t Rule Me.” The performance was gritty and unapologetic, featuring a thumping bass that shook the ground and a guitar solo that surged with intense energy. Williams’ bangs blew back in an invisible breeze as she growled out the lyrics. The third cover was the last song of her show, Neil Young’s 1991 hit “Rockin’ in the Free World,” which she did, in fact, rock.
Although Williams and the band made these songs their own, I was surprised that a third of the set consisted of covers, especially because Williams’ catalog of originals features such sonic diversity and breadth. The apparent role of these covers, to spur audience engagement with their catchiness and familiarity, felt to me like an underestimation of Williams’ discography and an unnecessary constraint on an already short set. For example, the political commentary of “Rocking in the Free World” could have been expressed by the sentiments of “American Dream,” and the energy of it by a rock number like “Real Live Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings.”
But maybe there weren’t more fitting songs to communicate her message than the ones she chose to play. Together, these three covers of “So Much Trouble in the World,” “You Can’t Rule Me,” and “Rockin’ in the Free World” wove together a narrative greater than any one artist’s work.
In the end, Williams seemed less concerned with showcasing her personal catalog than with using music as a platform for shared emotion and defiance. She closed her show with words of hope. “Music is the best way to fight against that evil stuff,” she said in her honeyed drawl. “Music is a great weapon. It’s a peace and love weapon.”
Featured images by: Danny Clinch
