Lucinda Williams: How the Grammy-Winning Singer Overcame a Stroke and Returned with a New Book and Album

Lucinda Williams is coming back with a brand new album, an autobiography and concerts around the world this spring. Three years ago, people were concerned if we would ever hear her music again after she had a stroke. One evening in November 2020, Lucinda was about to get in the shower when her husband, Tom Overby found her on the floor of the bathroom. She was rushed to the hospital right away.

She has been recovering for a long time and is still not fully better yet. A recent interview revealed that she said “I’m doing really well, I can walk again without needing to use a cane or anything. That was something I wasn’t sure about at first.” Her progress is slow and weak, so playing guitar isn’t an option – the strength in her left side isn’t enough to hold up the fret. With her 70th birthday just this past January, it’s natural to wonder if she’s pushing too hard with her recovery.

When you talk to her and her husband-manager, it’s easy to see how important it is for her to be back in music. It was once an escape for teenagers who were dealing with troubled home life, so she doesn’t want to let go of this hobby. She feels like the songs are just never ending!

She won’t retire either. When the thought crosses her mind, she immediately decides that she isn’t ready yet.

One critic noticed that when Melanie Williams began singing again last year following a stroke, her voice hadn’t been damaged. He said it was “magnificent” and praised her stage presence.

Williams also wrote her first book ever – an autobiography called “Don’t Tell Anybody The Secrets I Told You.” This happened before she had the stroke.

Williams said that writing her songs often comes from stories she tells, and the book is like a gift to her fans. Some people thought getting married to Overby would hurt Williams’ songwriting because many of her songs come from relationships in her past. They thought this was insulting, especially since it was only directed towards women.

It is really shocking to read her list of past relationships. She apparently had a liking for poets who drove motorcycles and it looked like none of them stayed with her for long.

You can make a bingo card of all the guys you have gone out with in the past, or almost went out with, and remember the songs each experience has inspired. Songs like “Lake Charles,” “Pineola,” “Joy,” “Passionate Kisses” and so on. There are even some well-known rock stars in there too! You might find songs that Ryan Adams and Paul Westerberg made about them specifically too.

The main point of her story is about how she overcame mental illness.

Williams’ mom was attacked when she was young and had to go in and out of hospitals because of it. Williams’ father would always say, “It’s not her fault–she’s just not feeling well.” As a result, the singer and their two other siblings had to grow up without a fully-present mother.

Lucinda’s dad was a travelling college teacher who moved the family around a lot. When he heard the song “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road”, which has a line about a young girl in the back seat with dirt and tears, he felt bad because she never knew that it was about her. It wasn’t all bad stuff though; Lucinda said her dad’s literary friends had even cooler parties than rock ‘n’ rollers did.

When the girl was 12, an undergraduate student of her father moved into their house as a “guardian”. She didn’t feel comfortable with this and had many thoughts swirling in her mind. Around that time she started to have signs of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). To make herself feel better, she began listening to music which helped create a more positive environment for her than what was actually going on in her life.

Williams hopes that speaking out about her story will be helpful to people who have experienced having a family member with mental health issues, or has their own mental health struggles.

“I was so done pretending these issues didn’t exist and trying not to bring them up,” she said. “I wanted to talk more freely about it, without feeling embarrassed.”

For many years, Lucinda Williams was overlooked in the music industry because her style was too rock for country and too country for rock ‘n’ roll. But when she was 45-years-old, her most successful album, “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road” released in 1998. Before this breakthrough, she had some strange jobs like giving out sausage samples in supermarkets. She has been through a lot of people who believed they knew better what to do with her career.

Williams said she wanted to be successful like some famous male singers like Bob Dylan and Neil Young, who are allowed to be creative with their music. But people don’t give the same freedom to female artists as they do males. Even though Williams has not completely achieved what she desired, she hopes that one day she would have the same opportunity too.

Her new album, called “Stories From a Rock ‘n’ Roll Heart” tells us stories about loving music, old bands, jukeboxes, bars and the sad passing of two rock legends – Tom Petty and Bob Stinson from The Replacements.

The songwriting was tough for Williams, as she normally wrote melodies on guitar. She ended up asking a musician named Jesse Malin for help. Williams’ husband, who mostly stayed behind the scenes of music, co-wrote all the songs and Travis Stephens helped with six of them.

At first, Williams was hesitant but then realized Tom Waits and his wife had both co-written some songs together. After seeing this, she felt more confident in collaborating together with her husband.

The album includes singing from the famous Bruce Springsteen and his wife, Patti Scialfa. Back in 2007, Bruce and Patti threw a dinner party that Williams and Overby attended on their second date.

Williams said she was very impressed to have Bruce’s unique sound on her record. She still gets starstruck thinking about it.