Holly Williams
Album: The Highway
Label: Georgina
Tracks: 11
Website: http://www.hollywilliams.com

Holly's the daughter of Hank Junior (and therefore the granddaughter of Hank), but that celebrated musical lineage shouldn't be used as an excuse for hype or extra coverage. On the strength of her debut album alone, 2004's The Ones We Never Knew, she was hailed as a very competent and intensely self-assured singer-songwriter in her own right. What was interesting even then was the way her own musical brand of Americana was steeped in country and yet she'd not even heard Hank Snr's music until after age 17, indeed she'd only come to realise its importance when she started hearing other contemporary songwriters namechecking him in their own songs!

Holly's been writing her own kind of songs since age eight, and now she's just turned 31 - so there's every chance that The Highway will get to satisfy the listener as a classy, mature, considered product of a s/s entirely confident and comfortable with her craft, putting a distinctly personal spin on universal themes. I know that's a cliché these days, but it's a convention that surprisingly few s/s manage to observe credibly, and Holly's one of these, more especially even on The Highway, her third album of original songs.

Powerful observation skills, allied to an equally powerful vocal delivery, are the hallmark of this new collection; there may be a tendency for Holly to dwell on the darker side of relationship issues - the combination of love and pain in particular - but when the results are as persuasive as Drinkin', Without You, the aching A Good Man and the bittersweet closer Waiting On June (about Holly's maternal grandmother June Bacon White), it's impossible not to warm to Holly's writing. Basically, the songs on The Highway have the ring of truth that sets the collection above a host of similar products on the market.

In addition, Holly's tough but emotional vocal delivery is seductive and yes, polished to a degree but still convincing, and its necessary vulnerable edges are (sensibly) laid bare by the sympathetic production of Charlie Peacock. The calibre of the crack team of support musicians speaks for itself - among them Chris Coleman (Holly's husband), Dan Dugmore, Andy Leftwich, Glenn Worf, Matt Slocum and Doug Lancio - as does the presence of Jackson Browne, Jakob Dylan, Gwyneth Paltrow and Dierks Bentley as background, or even duet, vocalists on assorted tracks.

The pure and simple arrangements are steered by approved country rhythms - and judicious use of bass and drums that motor the songs along gently but firmly; thus, the whole soundscape is thoroughly accessible while retaining plenty of punch and drive. And the disc's nicely packaged too, its booklet containing full lyrics and credits.

David Kidman