At this point in his career, Will Oldham can do pretty much whatever he wants. Before reaching his 30th birthday, he'd already mastered Leonard Cohen-aping folk gloom (on Palace Brothers' Days in the Wake), Appalachian country-rock (on Palace Music's Viva Last Blues), and darkly grand balladry (on Bonnie "Prince" Billy's I See a Darkness). But rather than continuing to reinvent himself, Oldham now seems to be resolving his dizzyingly multifold identity, shoring up the elements of his sound that have remained consistent throughout his career and subtly incorporating attributes of all of his past personas. If anything, this eight-song mini-LP (which consists of seven far-flung covers and one original) most closely recalls 1995's laidback and largely acoustic Hope EP, augmented with the female backing vocals and orchestral flourishes that mark his more recent work as Bonnie "Prince" Billy.
The most striking thing about Ask Forgiveness is its consistency. While you used to be able to spot a trademark Oldham curveball (an unexpected "fuck" or "dick," for example) from a mile away, his idiosyncrasies are increasingly being absorbed into the core of his approach, and no longer disrupt the continuity of his music. In a sense, it makes him less ostensibly interesting-- such ruptures are part of what made Oldham such an intriguing character in the first place-- but this turn toward unassuming directness is also making clear how singular Oldham is as an artist. What's both impressive and limiting about this release isn't so much the song selection, but rather the fact that every track is seamlessly rearranged to hit all the familiar Will Oldham notes.
Nowhere is this more apparent than on Oldham's cover of "I've Seen It All", originally recorded as a duet between Björk and Thom Yorke for the former's Selmasongs. In Oldham's hands, the hypnotic and protracted melodicism of the original song is replaced with a straightforward rustic ambience. By minimizing the massive textural and dynamics shifts of Björk's version, Oldham places much more emphasis on the song's beautifully stark lyrics. The multi-part harmonies and subtle strings that Oldham deploys during the song's chorus add a gradual and understated ebb and flow, without even attempting to recreate the grandiosity of the original.
Oldham's more conventional cover choices are no less successful. Mickey Newbury's "I Came Here to Hear the Music" opens Ask Forgiveness with impeccably arranged guitars and breathy female backing vocals. A cover of Phil Ochs' "My Life" shows Oldham imbuing his vocals with a subtle expressiveness that far exceeds the "whiskey-soaked" tone for which he's known. Even the most off-the-wall material (Danzig's "Am I Demon", R. Kelly's "The World's Greatest") come off as perfectly well-considered, totally free of awkwardness and/or cloying novelty. And the one Oldham original, "I Loved the Streets", is possibly the jauntiest tune here, unerringly concise and enjoyable.
Discussing at length how each of Oldham's covers varies from the original doesn't quite capture the spirit of this release. Ask Forgiveness doesn't offer Oldham's "take" on well-known and well-loved songs so much as it showcases a unique and distinctive musician performing a scattered set of songs he enjoys. Which is the best we could hope for: an unlikely and understated release from an artist with absolutely nothing to prove.
