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New music from Don Williams is here. Fans woke up to a treat on Friday morning following the release of Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes<\/a><\/em>, a new LP from the Gentle Giant<\/a>, who died in 2017.<\/p>\n The 12-song album, which features never-before-heard tracks that the legend recorded between 1979-1984, came to fruition after an unlikely discovery.<\/p>\n In a conversation with American Songwriter, Don\u2019s son, Tim Williams, revealed that his family uncovered the tapes in a storm cellar on their property, where they\u2019ve been stored for decades.<\/p>\n Tim admitted that he was initially \u201clukewarm\u201d about touching the tapes. However, at the behest of his late dad\u2019s longtime manager, he decided to get them digitally converted. When he did so, he discovered that, remarkably, his dad\u2019s vocal tracks were in near-perfect condition.<\/p>\n \u201cThere wasn\u2019t any degradation through the years,\u201d Tim marveled. \u201cThey still sounded like he had just done them last week or something.\u201d<\/p>\n Everything changed with that discovery, and Tim got to work executive producing the album. First, he had to determine which parts of the recordings were usable. Everything else, he came to determine, would have to be carefully reconstructed in the studio.<\/p>\n For the latter situation, Tim and Garth Fundis, who handled recording and mixing, turned to musicians Don had worked with over the course of his career.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were familiar with what Don would want and the kind of subtleties that the music had,\u201d Garth explained. \u201cThey could kind of have a head start knowing what the what the flavor would feel like.\u201d<\/p>\n Throughout the whole process, the men had one goal in mind.<\/p>\n \u201cMore than anything wanted it to sound like, \u2018What do you know? Daddy actually did a another record back in 1980 that nobody\u2019s heard,\u2019\u201d Tim said. \u201cWe just wanted it to sound like that, so it was real important that people understood what what it was supposed to sound like.\u201d<\/p>\n The finished product is one that both Tim and Garth are positive Don would approve of. That\u2019s largely the case because they knew Don liked all the songs on the album, even if he didn\u2019t get the chance to release them.<\/p>\n \u201cWe never felt like we put some [songs] away because we didn\u2019t like it or we changed our minds about it. It was just when we were sequencing, sometimes there\u2019s a couple of songs that might sound similar to something else,\u201d Garth explained. \u201c\u2026 The songs stand the test of time.\u201d<\/p>\n Garth added, \u201cAs somebody who spent a lot of time in the studio over the years with Don, I can tell you he\u2019d be tickled for everybody to hear this.\u201d<\/p>\n Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes<\/em>, Tim said, is \u201ca testament\u201d to how his dad worked.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were things that he had taken to the complete finish for what he wanted to do, and then for whatever reason, they just decided to go with something else,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I think he would be proud of it\u2026 He felt like he owed the listener, the fans, the very best that he could give them.\u201d<\/p>\n Photo by Jim McGuire<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\nHow Don Williams\u2019 Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes<\/em> Came to Be<\/h3>\n
How Don Williams Would Feel About His New LP<\/h3>\n