It’s a calm and casual Monday night in Cambridge, and that’s a perfect setting for a Jess Williamson performance around the rock club campfire. The Texas-born, Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter brings her enchanting blend of indie-folk and Americana to The Sinclair tonight (February 26), the latest stop on an East Coast tour showcasing last year’s inviting Mexican Summer album Time Ain’t Accidental. Williamson is perhaps best known as one-half of country duo Plains, alongside Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield, but last year’s new record brought her smoky compositions and weathered storytelling to the forefront.
Late last summer, the video for “Topango Two Step” made the rounds, and like other album standouts “Hunter” and “Chasing Spirits,” it paints a wider perspective of Williamson’s life experiences. When she sings “Take me for a ride,” it’s safe to say the Cambridge crowd will be willing to go wherever she wants. In this case, it may be the Lone Star State.
“For ‘Topanga Two Step’, we set out to make a video that captures the surreal landscape of the Texas Hill Country and feels like a daydream,” says Williamson. “We filmed on a ranch on the Guadalupe River and inside a Stonehenge replica. Lyrically, the song comes from a moment in my life when I was trying too hard to impress someone who was really different from me, but the rejection and weirdness I felt ended up guiding me into a deeper understanding of myself. I asked my partner Samuel Walker to direct the video because he shot the incredible cover photo of my new album, Time Ain’t Accidental, and I wanted to delve further into our visual collaboration. His vision for the video centered around this energy in the lyrics of sensuality, longing, and release.”
JESS WILLIAMSON + LE REN :: Monday, February 26 at The Sinclair, 52 Church St. in Cambridge, MA :: 7 p.m., 18-plus, $30 :: Event info and tickets
***