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Essence is the sixth studio album by American singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams, released on June 5, 2001, by Lost Highway Records.[3] The album debuted on the Billboard 200 at No. 28, selling approximately 44,500 copies in its first week.[4] By 2008, it had sold 336,000 copies in the U.S.[5]

Essence
Studio album by Lucinda Williams
Released	June 5, 2001
Genre	Blues rock[1] alternative country[2]
Length	50:58
Label	Lost Highway
Producer	Bo Ramsey Tom Tucker Lucinda Williams
Lucinda Williams chronology
Car Wheels on a Gravel Road (1998) Essence (2001) World Without Tears (2003)

A critical and commercial success, the album earned Williams three Grammy Award nominations in 2002; Best Contemporary Folk Album, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for the title track, and Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for the track "Get Right with God", which she won.[6]

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	82/100[3]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[7]
Blender	[8]
Chicago Sun-Times	[2]
Christgau's Consumer Guide	A−[9]
Entertainment Weekly	B+[10]
Los Angeles Times	[1]
Q	[11]
Rolling Stone	[12]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[13]
Spin	8/10[14]

Essence was met with widespread critical acclaim. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received an average score of 82, based on 11 reviews.[3] Reviewers observed a departure from Williams' similarly acclaimed 1998 album Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, with Rolling Stone citing the "willful intimacy" in Essence's music[12] and Spin contrasting the "halting, spare" presentation with its predecessor's "giddy, verbose" one.[14] AllMusic similarly stated "those hoping for another dose of the bluesy roots rock of Car Wheels on a Gravel Road may be disappointed, but if you want to take a deep and compelling look into the heart and soul of a major artist, then you owe it to yourself to hear Essence.[7]

The Village Voice critic Robert Christgau found it "imperfect" but still praised Williams' artistry, saying "[she] is too damn good to deny."[9] Salon regarded the album as "an emotional mess of a masterpiece".[15] Entertainment Weekly wrote "Lucinda Williams doesn’t merely wallow in suffering. She savors it like a glass of your finest Bordeaux", and called it her "folkiest, gentlest album" and "a steamy slow-crawl — southern humidity as music — that plays into her strengths as the Joan of Dark of the alt-country set".[10] Q listed Essence as one of the best 50 albums of 2001.[16]

Track listing

All tracks written by Lucinda Williams.[17]

Personnel

• Lucinda Williams – vocals, acoustic guitar
• Jim Keltner – drums
• Tony Garnier – bass, acoustic guitar
• Bo Ramsey – electric guitar
• Charlie Sexton – drums, hand drum, rhythm guitar, Hammond B3 organ, piano, background vocals, tremolo slide guitar
• Reese Wynans – Hammond B3 organ
• Jim Lauderdale – harmony vocals

Additional musicians:

• David Mansfield – viola
• Ryan Adams – tremolo guitar ("Essence")
• Gary Louris – background vocals ("Essence")
• Joy Lynn White – background vocals ("Get Right With God", "Bus to Baton Rouge", "Broken Butterflies")

Charts

Chart performance for Essence

Chart (2001)	Peak position
Australian Albums (ARIA)[18][19]	59
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)[20]	47
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista)[21]	29
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[22]	47
UK Albums (OCC)[23]	63
US Billboard 200[24]	28

References

External links

• Essence at Discogs (list of releases)
• Lucinda Williams Official Website

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