He’s only 38, but Willie Watson often sounds like a man from an earlier time. On his new album, “Folksinger Vol. 2,” the Americana singer, guitarist and banjo player covers the work of a string of roots music legends including Lead Belly and Furry Lewis. Sensitive as Watson is to the source material, he remains his own man — one who isn’t interested in playing note-for-note copies.
“At the end of the day, all I can do is sing these songs in the only way I know how, in whatever way that is comfortable to me,” Watson says, calling from a tour stop in San Luis Obispo, Calif. “Whatever is going to come out will come out.”
He performs at the Old Town School of Folk Music on Wednesday.
A founding member of the rootsy and rustic band Old Crow Medicine Show, Watson left the group in 2011 and struck out on his own. He released his solo debut, “Folksinger Vol. 1,” in 2014. His new follow-up album, like its predecessor, was released on Acony Records. The indie label was founded in 2001 by alt-country stars Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.
Welch and Rawlings have long been influential figures in Watson’s life. For her part, Welch has been a thoughtful sounding board on various musical projects through the years. Rawlings served as producer on Old Crow Medicine Show’s early work and returned to helm the board for both of Watson’s “Folksinger” albums.
“Dave produced Old Crow’s first two records, so he has a good handle on how I play,” Watson says. “Dave and I have very similar tastes. We love all the same music. We like good honest quality work. That’s why it works so well in the studio. Another reason is that I stay out of Dave’s way and I try not to co-produce the record. I just let him do it. We’re on the same page, but he’s one notch up on the scale — he often has insight into things I miss. That’s why it’s such a good mesh.”
The connection between the two men doesn’t stop there. Watson also plays in Rawlings’ band the Dave Rawlings Machine. It’s a seamless fit, built on a familiarity that comes from years of playing and working together.
“Being in that band is really easy,” Watson notes. “Everyone comes together musically. Nobody has to talk much about what they’re going to do. We don’t have to go over parts. I don’t think we’ve ever discussed who’s singing what in a harmony. That’s the beauty when you have a good thing going with a band.”
That deep and comfortable relationship shows on the new album, a release filled with a mix of gritty Delta blues, raw mountain tunes, haunting folk and forlorn ballads. There’s an air of lamentation to the dark and spare “Gallows Pole,” while “When My Baby Left Me” is filled with metallic slashes of slide guitar.
One of the covers is “Dry Bones,” a gospel number by Appalachian folk icon Bascom Lamar Lunsford. Packed with biblical imagery torn from the Old Testament, the song springs to new life under Watson’s piercing cry of a voice and ecstatic banjo playing.
“It’s spiritual,” he says about “Dry Bones.” “I call it a badass gospel song. It’s so gritty. Then you get to the chorus where the light from heaven is shining all around. Purity and redemption wash over you. I’m not a Christian, and I don’t think I would ever identify with any organized religion. But it’s very intriguing and tempting. They do have a good thing going on, having that kind of faith and fellowship. A huge part of me wishes I could surrender to that.”
The album’s guest cameos include Welch, Paul Kowert of the experimental roots band Punch Brothers and Old Crow member Morgan Jahnig. The gospel group the Fairfield Four show up to accompany Watson on “Samson and Delilah,” a traditional song about the titular biblical characters. Watson was inspired by the version recorded by the esteemed blues and gospel singer Reverend Gary Davis.
Watson has always been a fan of America’s heritage artists in country, blues and folk. He grew up in Watkins Glen, N.Y., and honed his rootsy chops playing with other musicians in the old time music scene that revolved around Ithaca, N.Y. In 1998, he formed Old Crow Medicine Show with original members Ketch Secor and Chris “Critter” Fuqua.
The band made an impression wherever they played, from coffeehouses and street corners to Doc Watson’s annual MerleFest music festival. The members wore a mix of vintage clothes and scruffy punk duds as they combined old time string-band music with a scrappy upbeat energy.
“There were definitely a few mohawks floating around back then,” Watson laughs about the band’s style in its early days. “We had a bit of a rough edge.”
They were indeed edgy roots revivalists who made an impact. The band’s live shows and recordings went on to influence a number of up-and-coming musicians who came in their wake, including Marcus Mumford of Mumford & Sons.
“Old Crow was in the right place at the right time,” Watson recalls. “We had been around for a year before the 2000 film ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’ came out. That movie got a lot of people interested in (old time music), so we were the first thing people turned to. We were hipster kids who played banjos. All of a sudden, all these other people started liking banjo music.”
Although his years playing with the hard-touring Old Crow seasoned him as a player, Watson has fully evolved into his own singular performer. He’s also recently expanded his career into the world of movies. He’ll make his acting debut in the Coen Brothers’ western anthology “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs,” expected to air on Netflix in 2018.
“It was an inadvertent, almost accidental thing,” Watson says with a laugh. “I’ve never been interested in acting, and I’ve never been an actor. But I became friends with Ethan and Joel Coen a number of years ago. When I’m in New York they come out to my shows.”
The Coens initially asked Watson to audition for their 2016 film “Hail, Caesar!” Although Watson didn’t get that role, the sibling filmmakers told him they did want to cast him in their next film. In “Buster Scruggs,” he plays a cowboy.
“They dressed me up in some cool cowboy duds,” Watson says. “I learned how to twirl a six-shooter, and I got good at riding a horse.”
As for his music, Watson notes that at every date on his tour he meets new fans who are discovering him for the very first time.
“I love those folks,” he says. “I don’t have to lean on my credit with Old Crow to get people to the shows. It’s like starting over.”
When: 7 p.m. Wednesday
Where: Old Town School of Folk Music, 4544 N. Lincoln Ave.
Tickets: $24; 773-728-6000 or www.oldtownschool.org
Chrissie Dickinson is a freelance writer.
onthetown@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @chitribent
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