Release Date: Jan 21, 2011
Genre(s): Folk, Pop/Rock, Alternative/Indie Rock, Indie Folk, American Underground, Alternative Folk
Record label: Tompkins Square
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Every genre has its icons and its iconoclasts. Rock'n'roll will likely always have both bands that sound like Led Zeppelin and bands that absorbed Led Zeppelin but marched proudly in an unforeseen direction. Country music has chicken grease-and-cheap beer adherents in addition to pop crossover darlings, while rap brims with boom-bap purists and backpacking sonic explorers.
Nashville guitarist William Tyler is well known in musician's circles. At home he's called "Willy T," and he's made a name for himself in the indie rock and folk worlds collaborating with everyone from the Silver Jews and Lambchop to Simone White and Bonnie Prince Billy. His own solo debut, Behold the Spirit, on New York's wondrous Tompkins Square label, is aptly titled.
Behold the guitar. Master it and Western music is at your fingertips; ignore it at your own peril. Nashville native William Tyler has played the six-string on albums from some of indie rock's heavyweights: the Silver Jews' Bright Flight and Tanglewood Numbers, Lambchop's Aw Cmon and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy's Master and Everyone, just to name a few. It's an impressive list, and listening to Behold the Spirit you get the feeling that he has the talent, vision and know-how to go anywhere he wants.
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