Bonnie “Prince” Billy

By user • Mar 1st, 2009 • Category: Band Bios

As an actor, Will Oldham has portrayed a vanishing demolition-derby driver, a post-graduate townie reluctant of adulthood, and a former Alaskan construction worker. But his most consistent persona has been as Bonnie “Prince” Billy, the pseudonym under which he has consistently released his warbling, folksy tales of Americana upbringings since 1998. Before assuming that role a decade ago, his tunes came by way of Palace, Palace Brothers and once (with 1997’s Joya) under his real name. Yet it’s as “Prince” that the scruffy, 38-year-old Kentuckian has settled into most comfortably, with fragile acoustic albums that don’t sound too far removed or sonically different from Oldham’s actual Bluegrass State roots. With a sound — and a stage presence — that teeters between quaint Southern sincerity and a spooky, backwoods unkemptness, “Prince” allows his audience to identify with his character while leaving them wondering just how much of it is an act and how much is the real Oldham.

Chicago Innerview Magazine, March 2009

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