One of the most disparaging injustices within today’s jamband circuit is the misconception of Keller Williams, a misguided line of thinking that deduces Keller Williams as simply a special guest invitee, a "hired musician" if you will, for such notable bands as The String Cheese Incident and Leftover Salmon. Being that Keller Williams is a musician that electively chooses to stand alone by means of his innovative "one-man band" agenda; music appreciators, and fans alike, feel the necessity to associate Keller with either of the aforementioned bands. Seemingly societal members find comfort when they can link a Mick Jagger to The Rolling Stones or a Jimmy Page to Led Zeppelin, for in those particular cases one gains the ability to link a particular musician to a "favorable team" and/or "grander stage." However the time has come, a mandate that is allowable when an artist has produced seven albums and has toured for nearly twelve years, for music listeners to resist the urge of conjoining Keller Williams with other musicians of his genre; rather acknowledge the overall grandeur and splendor of this man as an independent, dominating artist.
Remember that it is Vince Herman of Leftover Salmon and Bill Nershi of The String Cheese Incident that depend upon their highly-skilled, dynamic drummers in order to maintain the open-ended, improvisational sound that both of these bands pride themselves upon. Whereas it is Keller that looks upon none other than himself to create the coveted drum beats, detailed bass lines that prevail and dominate his music. Keller’s vast stage arsenal ranges from eight, tightly-tuned, solid body guitars, grand piano, xylophone, drums, various percussion-oriented instruments, as well as a trustee digital machine that enables Keller to "layer" and "loop" his music into a perfectly rhythmic sequence.
Keller’s artistry and musicianship is equally prevalent in both the realm of studio work and touring, a statement validated by Keller’s exhaustive, musical endeavors in 2002. A twelve month span that found Williams performing over 100 nationwide shows and producing the sixth and seventh albums of his decorated, active musical career. Keller’s yearly planner for May 2002 was "unKellerish" in the sense that the Taurus-celebrated month found one lone date, a beautifully orchestrated show at the "All Good Music Festival" in Terra Alta, WV. As a result the barefoot wonder was left with the sole intention of completing his most recently celebrated album, Dance.
Within the confines of the aptly air-conditioned, "Wally Cleaver’s Recording Studio," situated in Fredericksburg, Virginia, Keller and fellow musicians completed the makings to
Dance." Using the existing material from
Laugh," which is yet another one of Keller’s 2002 contributions, Williams laid down the foundation and detailed nuances to
Dance. In his own words, Keller describes
Dance as, "a pseudo house remix of my most recent release
Laugh … creating new, techno sounding, dance songs by using state of the art technology. It is basically me trying to find my inner DJ."
The Jeff Covert engineered album of Dance finds such unique elements as Kevin Morris’ "hand clapping," Cam Morin’s "phone messaging" techniques, plus the unfamiliar sounds of dobros, guitar synths, and an electric whammy strat. Un characteristic to Keller’s normal work which finds lyrics ranging from witty to satiric, Dance is essentially an all-instrumental, electronica-inspired album. Within the album, one is not likely to find songs that hail in comparison to such gems as "One Hit Wonder"---which draws amusement out of the pop-music culture. What a joke! Although Dance does not concur nor mirror some of Keller’s earlier works, it is an album that finds the necessities. In that Dance still finds the gifted Tye North on bass (formerly of Leftover Salmon, as well as a major contributor in Laugh), continuing with Keller’s mastery of the 10-string by means of his seemingly nonreplicable finger picking, as well as the foundation to all of Keller’s music---the "mouth flugel."
So the burning, underlying question still stands: "Is
Dance worth the price of purchase?" This I don’t know; but what I do know is that with
Dance, you can go ahead and associate, group, entrap Keller with all the musicians you wish---for
Dance is not a solo album.
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