Jayvee Music Reviews with Jeff Vallet

When Jason D. Williams recorded Hillbillies and Holy Rollers as a nod to some of his musical heroes, he didn’t merely pay homage to their spirits – he communed directly with several, recording in the very same studio where hillbilly and holy-roller music first metamorphosed into devilish rock n’ roll.
Not only does he live just a stone’s throw or two away, both Williams and his mentor, rockabilly guitarist Sleepy LaBeef, were on the Sun Records label earlier in their careers. Of course, he also bears a strong musical kinship to the alchemists of that metamorphosis – guys like Elvis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis – who made much history in that space.
Williams actually shares more than musical kinship with one member of that quartet – he also, apparently, shares DNA. He is likely the biological son of Jerry Lee Lewis, a fact Lewis has acknowledged publicly, though anyone who’s heard or witnessed Rockin’ Jason D. Williams kill a keyboard never had a doubt.
This wild man gives his own spin on the 11 tracks of Hillbillies and Holy Rollers. The album, produced by fellow rockabilly wild man Dale Watson, shakes its way through honky-tonk, boogie-woogie, jazz, R&B and a whole lotta other styles. Along the way, songs like “Folsom Prison Blue” and “Sweet Georgia Brown” are reinvented and reinvigorated. He squeezes a little yodeling into “Honky Tonk Hardwood Floor” and makes his boogie-woogie fingers fly on Joe Ely’s “Fingernails.”
But of course, all that Saturday-night carrying-on demands a little Sunday-morning reflection, and we get it in “Old Time Religion” and the tent-revival, “pew-jumper” gospel of the final cut, “I’ll Fly Away.”
This collection is unique and inspiring. Williams presents a strong album for your approval!