As an homage to my favorite form of literature (The “Choose your own adventure” format), we introduce you to the “Choose your own bio”. If you are interested in a carefully crafted publicist approved recitation on Creede Williams, the artist, please turn to CHOICE 1. In the event you are less interested in a polished for the media presentation and prefer reading about an acoustic musician that plays a-rhythmically, often times sings too earnestly(with his eyes closed) and generally finds himself smitten by his own words.Choose CHOICE 2.
Choice 1:
Creede Williams, the legitimate artist who pulled himself up by his bootstraps, overcame adversity to find critical acclaim, public adoration and most of all….his own voice.
There are many things you can't tell about Creede Williams from listening to his second album After the Letters. You can't tell that the Dallas musician learned to play guitar while writing and recording his 2005 debut album Something Borrowed. You can't tell that when he's not touring he works as lawyer in the violent world of professional wrestling. However, in an instant of listening you immediately notice one thing—this is an engaging, genuine and unabashedly upfront artist—and it isn't often that the music of a singer-songwriter can speak so loudly for itself.
Williams, who hails from a family of gospel singers, never imagined himself as a musician. He's spent his years earning a law degree, working as a “suit” in LA, and juggling the duties of an ordinary guy. However, as it so often plays out, some of the most beautiful things are borne out of the seemingly mundane. Williams finds himself, four years since his debut, a career musician and every bit the insightful wordsmith. Known for his self-deprecating humor onstage, Williams has played over 200 shows in the past three years, been selected as a Coca-Cola Artist of the Month, chosen as one of the best eight unsigned singer/songwriters in America, and taken part in an unaired reality TV series that featured the likes of Eric Hutchinson and G-Love.
The critically acclaimed debut, Something Borrowed, which featured the talents of the artists behind acts such as Vertical Horizon, Jackopierce and Robin Thicke, displayed an artist discovering an eye for detail and a knack for delivering colorful melodies. Williams' follow-up proves to be an even more ambitious and strongly written work.
“Because I'm not a musician first, the words always come first,” Williams says. “I've always written short stories. I typically write a story and look at the words and it never fails that something I've written feels like the start of a song. After the Letters has a pretty clear concept that draws all the songs together. It's what happens in between—between the breakup and the new relationship, or between the lay off and the new job, or between graduation and your first job. It's purgatory. That position between what was and what's going to be….the dreaming and the being.”
Influentially speaking, Williams reconnected with some of his earlier favorites. He culled inspiration from R.E.M., Counting Crows, James Taylor and Van Morrison. His goal, he says, was to create something that delivered an uncluttered story in an emotionally honest way.
Armed with a massive number of new songs, Williams headed to Nashville where he recorded his new disc on and off over seven months. There, he was joined in the studio by veteran producer Cary Pierce (Jack Ingram, Graham Colton, Jackopierce, Guster) and musicians that included Tommy B (Prince, Switchfoot, Stevie Wonder), Aaron Sands (Jars of Clays, Toad The Wet Sprocket, Caedman's Call) and Greg Suran (Goo Goo Dolls, Five For Fighting, Jewel), who helped Williams augment his songs into a collection of ‘90s-influenced, radio-ready songs that surge with sincerity and catchiness.
After the Letters, which shifts from the charming blue-eyed soul of “Telegirl” to “Letting You Down,” a compelling, emotive duet between Williams and Leigh Nash (Sixpence None the Richer), to the subtly twangy “Every Wrong Turn,” encapsulates all the elements of the human experience, distilling the nuanced and subjective nature of our lives into twelve distinct songs. Each track tells its own story, and, in turn, all twelve work together to narrative a larger, cohesive portrait of what it means to be stuck in the interim.
That position is also true of Williams, who learned something valuable between the release of his first album and the making of his second. No matter how many jokes he makes or how he spends his days in an office, Williams is a musician. Neither he nor the public can deny that fact after hearing After the Letters, and that's really all you need to know.
Choice 2:
Creede Williams, I write songs, enjoy a nice pair of argyle socks and often times crave the delicacy of a Chick-o-stick…….
I grew up in Southeastern Oklahoma, the son of an English teacher and a car lot owner. My days consisted of Ray Charles voice bouncing off the service department cement. My nights were all Van Morrison and nerf basketball. I spent most summers on my Grandfather's ranch or hustling people on a tennis court.
My first grade teacher said I'd never learn to read. Following law school, I moved to Los Angeles (where a lot of people can't read). Movies stars, boulevards, mail carts and psychotic executives quickly devoured my burgeoning career as a movie agent. Some of my friends still hang out on big screens at your movie theater. A lot of my friends in Texas make fun of my show business friends.
I currently balance singing and performing while working in the professional wrestling business as an attorney. People rarely confuse me with my wrestling clients.
Strangely enough, I unconsciously mimic the dialect of whomever I'm speaking with and I generally drive slow.
I wrote my first record on the highway while driving back to Texas. A lot of people still play the record while on the road. Sometimes I do. It's not as vain as it sounds. Maybe.
Some people make a record, tour the country, star in an (unaired)reality tv show and sign(and lose) a record deal. I'm no different from some people.
Folks are nice when they think you're just starting something. The critics generally liked my debut release “Something Borrowed”. Audiences around the country moved in unison to many of the live shows. I'm putting the finishing touches on the second record, “After the letters”. I think you should buy a Cadillac-full when it comes outit just might change your life or mine.
