Four-time Grammy Award-winning artist Joy Williams’highly anticipated new solo album, Front Porch, will be released May 3 via Sensibility/Thirty Tigers and is now available for pre-order. The album features twelve songs including the title track, which debuts today—listen/share here. Each digital pre-order comes with an immediate download of “Front Porch” as well as two previously released songs, “Canary” and “The Trouble With Wanting.”

In celebration of the release, Williams will embark on a headline tour this winter and spring with stops in L.A., San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, Boston, NYC, Philadelphia, DC and Nashville among many others. See below for a complete itinerary.

Produced by Kenneth Pattengale of The Milk Carton Kids and engineered by Matt Ross-Spang, Front Porch represents a new chapter in Williams’ career, who recorded the album in Nashville during the pregnancy of her second child. She reflects, “There is an energy that is very creative in having a baby. It gives a sense of urgency on top of all the creative energy. Cellularly, your body is experiencing something really different. Everything you are feeling is elevated. And you have a time-stamped sense of urgency.” Already receiving praise, Rolling Stone states the new music, “…is both familiar and new, and explicitly clear that there’s nothing missing when she goes it alone.”

“So much of this is about coming home,” says Williams. “Whether to a physical place or to yourself. The lines on my face, I can see them more clearly now. But a lot of them are laugh lines. This record feels like breathing more deeply into who I am. Come what may.”

Two songs from the forthcoming record—“Canary” and “The Trouble With Wanting”—were released last fall to critical acclaim. Of “Canary,” Rolling Stone proclaims, “As usual, her voice stills the spotlight, with everything building toward Williams’ ringing, crystal-clear glory note in each chorus,” and Houston Chronicle furthers, “Williams’ vocal on the song reflects the assertiveness of its subject. A moment in its refrain finds her reaching high for a note and finding it.” In addition to the official audio, live performance versions of both tracks—filmed at a 2018 show at The Franklin Theatre—can be viewed here: “Canary (Live)” and “The Trouble With Wanting (Live).” Most recently, Williams’ cover of Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence” was released as part of her “Live from the Front Porch” series.
Photo credit: Andy Barron

Joy Williams is the winner of four Grammy Awards. She has released four solo albums and four EPs since her self-titled debut in 2001. She was half of The Civil Wars from 2009 until 2014, after which she released her solo LP, 2015’s VENUS, which was praised by NPR Music for it’s “new, more adventurous pop sound,” furthering, “Williams takes on this material without shirking its heaviness, but her gift for melodies that rise up like warm winds brings a climate of grace to even the most difficult subject matter.”

FRONT PORCH TRACK LIST

1. Canary
2. Front Porch
3. When Does a Heart Move On
4. All I Need
5. The Trouble With Wanting
6. No Place Like You
7. One and Only
8. When Creation Was Young
9. Preacher’s Daughter
10. Hotel St. Cecilia
11. Be With You
12. Look How Far We’ve Come

JOY WILLIAMS TOUR DATES

February 25—Phoenix, AZ—Musical Instrument Museum*
February 26—Solana Beach, CA—Belly Up Tavern*
February 27—West Hollywood, CA—The Troubadour*
March 1—Santa Cruz, CA—The Rio Theatre*
March 2—San Francisco, CA—The Swedish American Music Hall*
March 4—Portland, OR—Doug Fir Lounge*
March 5—Seattle, WA—Tractor Tavern*
March 6—Vancouver, BC—Wise Hall*
March 8—Boise, ID—Neurolux*
March 9—Salt Lake City, UT—The State Room*
March 12—Boulder, CO—The Fox Theatre*
March 13—Denver, CO—Globe Hall*
March 14—Kansas City, MO—Knuckleheads*
April 12—Columbus, OH—The Athenaeum Theatre*
April 13—Grand Rapids, MI—Calvin College: Covenant Fine Arts Center*
April 15—Minneapolis, MN—Cedar Cultural Center*
April 16—Milwaukee, WI—The Back Room at Collectivo Coffee*
April 18—Toronto, ON—The Great Hall*
April 19—Montreal, QC—Le Ritz PDB*
April 20—Boston, MA—City Winery*
April 22—New York, NY—Bowery Ballroom*
April 24—Philadelphia, PA—World Cafe Live (Downstairs)*
April 25—Brooklyn, NY—Rough Trade NYC*
April 27—Washington, DC—Miracle Theatre*
April 28—Charlottesville, VA—The Southern Cafe and Music Hall*
April 29—Carrboro, NC—ArtsCenter*
May 3—Nashville, TN—3rd & Lindsley*
May 4—Nashville, TN—3rd & Lindsley*

*with support from Anthony da Costac