Song of the Day: Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Whipped

Every Monday through Friday, we deliver a different song as part our Song of the Day podcast subscription. This podcast features exclusive KEXP in-studio performances, unreleased songs, and recordings from independent artists that our DJs think you should hear. Today’s song, featured on The Midday Show with Cheryl Waters, is “Whipped” by Bonnie "Prince" Billy from the 2014 album Singer's Grave A Sea of Tongues on Drag City.

Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Whipped (MP3)

Earlier this year, singer/songwriter Will Oldham (a.k.a. Bonnie "Prince" Billy) quietly released his eleventh full-length album, a reworking of his 2011 release, Wolfroy Goes to Town, including a couple of b-sides from its singles.

On Singer's Grave..., the minimal instrumentation of Wolfroy... is replaced with a fuller production, enhanced with the addition of mandolin, pedal steel, banjo, ukulele, piano, and more. Songs are retitled, shortened or lengthened, but still retain Oldham's distinctively dark folk sound. Nashville-based gospel singers The McCrary Sisters step in on backing vocals, and, in fact, almost steal the spotlight on today's Song of the Day, "Whipped," originally released as a b-side to the Wolfroy... track "Time to Be Clear." Together, their voices rise to a crescendo as Oldham's lovesick narrator sings, "Must be love/I'm whipped and cowed/And I'll whoop and holler... If I'm allowed."

Bonnie "Prince" Billy lurks quietly on Twitter here, but hasn't seemed to embrace Facebook yet. Watch Bonny perform today's Song of the Day in the KEXP studios back in 2012 below, in a performance he says was the first time he had performed it by himself in front of anyone: