Talk:Will Oldham

Untitled

I don't know how to add things to a 'to do list', but I think it would be nice if every will oldham-record would get its own page. Especially the more recent (let's say the bonnie "prince" billy-) records. And while we're at it, why don't we use the 'standard' music-album-outline that wiki uses for albums of major artist? You know, the ones with the 'album-information'-box at the right side. Leo44

I'm (very slowly!) doing this. I've just created Lost Blues and Other Songs. The whole Will Oldham article (as well as the albums) could do with a lot more detail but I don't really know enough about the guy.Tdrawler 23:22, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

I've created a stand-alone discogrpahy. His is a bit confusing, but I tried to make it clear (thanks to the info on Leo's page). ikes 19:49, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Bonnie 'Prince' Billy influences

It is possible that the historical figure Bonnie 'Prince' Charlie, an 18th century Jacobite pretender to the throne of Great Britain who garnered much support in the Scottish Highlands, played an influence in the Bonnie 'Prince' Billy moniker. It is also possible that Billy the Kid, the 19th century American outlaw, also known as William Bonney, may have been an influence.

This paragraph is pretty horrible at the minute. It is also possible (although extremely unlikely) that Kermit the Frog may have been an influence!. Also, I think that some of the information about Charlie and Billy the Kid is unnecessary. I've replaced it with a more compact version.--Tdrawler 22:14, August 30, 2005 (UTC)

May 2006 cleanup tag

This section needs clean up per WP's style guide, whose relevant section reads:

In popular music, album titles should be in italics, and song titles should be in quotes (i.e. The Beatles' song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" comes from their 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band). (Wikipedia:Manual of Style (music)#Popular_music)

Jonathan F 02:46, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Images

Hi. It seems the images with dodgy copyright status have been removed, which just leaves the GFDL/CC-BY 2.5 one I took earlier this year. So, although these are all fairly similar (and of small size), I've uploaded them in case they can be used somewhere. Cheers, - Gobeirne 06:16, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

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Lists lists lists

In my opinion, this article is getting incredibly dry and consisting almost entirely of lists:

• [he] has recorded under many names including a, b, c ...

• [he] has appeared in the films x, y, z ...

The 'other work' section is also too long and needs trimming (in my opinion). For example, was the 'collaboration' with Johnny Cash any more than singing backing vocals on ISAD? it hardly seems worth noting that.

I know the guy's appeared under many different names and collaborated with many different people, but I'd suggest just keeping the ones that we can write a bit more than "WO has collaborated with X on EP Y" about. Off the top of my head this would include (this list is far from complete) Tortoise, Matt Sweeney, Amalgamated Sons etc.

I'm happy to have a go at re-writing this (when I find the time; may not be for a while) but just thought I'd gauge opinions before making major changes. Does anyone else share my view, or is it better as it is?

Also, does anyone know whether the birthdate is accurate? I always thought it was unknown (to us). Any sources? Tdrawler 21:34, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

i agree with you, especially concerning the collaboration list. as for a re-write, go for it! ikes 21:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

---Actually, it IS worth noting that Jonny Cash picked a Will Oldham song, "I See a Darkness" to play on his covers album, it was quite more than Will just doing backup. I mean... in my humble.

Acting Section

I tried to clean up this section a bit, still think some information could be removed or better placed, such as the Tripping with Caveh stuff. Hope I didn't step on any toes with the small bit I did do, i.e. removing Julien Donkey-Boy. It is only an uncredited role... Worden 17:40, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Recording Section

Moved things around a bit, added the Collaboration subsection. I think we need to combine the Other Work List with this section. That list gotta go! Worden 21:59, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Album gallery

The gallery looks great, but it might be a bit overpowering for the article, particularly when there's already a Will Oldham discography article devoted to the topic. I'd be in favour of taking the gallery format out of this article, and using it to replace the table-based layout currently in the discography article. - Gobeirne 03:10, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

True. I'll change that, since I added it. Snow1215 21:57, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

I also did some overall cleanup to the article, but to me it seems best not to have the 2nd image, so I removed that too... sorry. Thoughts? Snow1215 02:17, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

• Obviously I'm biased, but I think free images are preferable to fair-use where possible, and the second image showed him doing what he does, which is important. However, I've just had a look at the current article, and agree there's no spot where it sits comfortably at the moment, so it can stay out - Gobeirne 21:05, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Moniker

I've removed the bit about the inspiration behind the Bonnie 'Prince' Billy moniker ("According to Oldham, the name draws inspiration from a number of sources, including Bonnie Prince Charlie, Billy the Kid, and Nat King Cole") due to a lack of a reference. If anyone has one, please add it back with a reference. Thanks! Snow1215 14:48, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind, I found the source and worked it back into the article. Snow1215 18:12, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

"Iconic" Spiderland photo

This has been added in twice now, second time here, despite two editors having previously taken out this kind of opinion-asserted-as-fact addition in respect of the Slint album. "Iconic" and "critically acclaimed" usually fall foul at some point of one or other of the rules here about neutrality, original research or weasel words. The former in particular is a particularly strong assertion, while the latter is at least less definitive, but for precisely that reason, pretty bland and uninformative. Anyway, I read the main Spiderland page, as suggested. All I can see is slightly pretentious quotes from two reviews - one in a Seattle freesheet, the other from Michigan University's student newspaper - that say they quite like the album cover. I'm not sure that justifies inserting the unqualified statement that the cover is "iconic". Nor do I see why it's needed in order to justify the reference in this article to the fact that Oldham took the photo. --Nickhh (talk) 14:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Links

From the content guideline on external links - "it is not Wikipedia's purpose to include a lengthy or comprehensive list of external links related to each topic. No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justifiable according to this guideline and common sense. The burden of providing this justification is on the person who wants to include an external link".

For me at least, common sense if nothing else suggests that the list is too long. Not every random gig review needs to be posted here, or multiple pages sourced to the same original site. Of course someone at some point decided to add them, but that doesn't mean that they were right to, or that we don't get to a point where too many have accumulated. Two editors have tried to trim the list in the last couple of days. When I did it it here, I included some fairly clear reasons as to what I was taking out and why. My cuts were just blindly reverted en masse, so that all the links were put back. As well as the linkfarm tag. Having dug deeper into the links, it seems half of the ones blindly put back in are dead anyway. So, I'm taking them out again. Individual gig reviews and other short pieces from random websites will go out again. The full media profiles from serious sources, I shall leave, although ideally of course these should be used as sources to expand the main body of the article itself. If one editor wishes to restore any of them, please do it individually and explain why in each case - that's the right way round for the burden.

If it helps at all, when I saw the first editor had removed a large number of them, as well as other material, I assumed it was vandalism. However, I stopped to actually look at what they had done, and it was clear there was a rationale behind it. Please read the above, actually have a look at the links that are being removed and ultimately allow me the same benefit of WP:AGF rather resorting to another knee-jerk reversion? N-HH talk/edits 17:04, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Response

The Response section here is inconsistent with the Tributes section in the discography article. They either need to match exactly (which would be pointless), or be combined and relegated to one of the articles. VillageGreen1215 (talk) 14:40, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Response should be in the main article and perhaps a similar section (Will Oldham covers?!) added to the more specific Discography page. Snoop God (talk) 16:31, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Birthday

Birthday is wrong. Should be 1/15 according to source 1. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.167.3.146 (talk) 05:20, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

AS OF 3/21/14 the birthday is still incorrect. Per Source 1 the birthday is January 15, not 12/24.

Please fix. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.147.104.146 (talk) 03:01, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

According to source 1: (p.VII-VIII) «The facts are these: Will was born in Louisville, Kentucky, on January 15, 1970 (not December 24, as some profiles would have it).

Please fix. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.39.54.180 (talk) 21:16, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Various IPs have been changing the date without giving a specific reference, but looking back at what "source 1" was in 2014, the IP is referring to "Alan Licht (Ed.) (2012), Will Oldham on Bonnie 'Prince' Billy. Faber and Faber Ltd., London, pp. viii. ISBN 978-0-571-25814-7, which does indeed say the birthdate is January 15. This conflicts with The Encyclopedia of Popular Music source, which says December 24. As it is a full book on Oldham, the Licht source may be the better one. Thoughts? Dialectric (talk) 15:42, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

Article should be rewritten

As of now it's overly focused on his name changes (which largely ended 15 years ago), with a scattered list of "responses" which don't add up to anything. Someone should use the "Will Oldham on Bonnie 'Prince' Billy" book and write a brief summary of biographical and artistic career points. Right now it is a pretty worthless article for a highly valued contemporary artist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by A48205864 (talk • contribs) 23:04, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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External links modified (February 2018)

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• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081202151640/http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/music/top/documents/02671921.htm to http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/music/top/documents/02671921.htm

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I intend to make some changes to this article soon.

hello wikipeople, I intend to make some careful but comprehensive changes and additions to this article in the coming weeks. I'm very familiar with Will's work and have decided that I can improve the article. If anyone holds parts of this article dear to their heart and expects that my changes might bother them, please feel free to contact me to discuss. Thanks to all who have contributed thus far! ♥♥♥ Caerulescens (talk) 21:37, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Requesting article move

{{subst:requested move|Will Oldham|reason= "Bonnie 'Prince' Billy" is one of several artistic projects created by the artist Will Oldham. Factually, the article title should be "Will Oldham" to refer to the artist who created Bonnie "Prince" Billy. Caerulescens (talk) 15:09, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 23 October 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Moved to Will Oldham per consensus. Caerulescens, one needs to have a WP:Page mover user right to move the pages that both have non-trivial history. No such user (talk) 14:32, 30 November 2020 (UTC) No such user (talk) 14:32, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

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Will Oldham (musician) → Bonnie "Prince" Billy – This is the title where the article had been until recently. The article states that this artist used 'Bonnie "Prince" Billy' as "the name for most of his work". Caerulescens attempted a move discussion above (to move the article to the artist's birth name [to be factually correct]) but the template was not transculded properly. They then went ahead with the move without discussion. Even if this is the better name, which it probably isn't per WP:COMMONNAME, the article should be at Will Oldham, not Will Oldham (musician). MB 03:33, 23 October 2020 (UTC) —Relisting. BegbertBiggs (talk) 23:43, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi MB! - Following are some of the reasons behind my attempted move. I apologize for attempting/enacting the move without discussion.

In a 2012 interview about the creation of Bonnie "Prince" Billy, in 1998, Oldham stated "[I]t turned the music into an individual, which seemed to be what everyone - the audience, or at least the people I was forced to talk to about the music - was seeking. They were seeking some sort of individual responsible for things, and I was just like, 'OK. We'll make one up. One who doesn't really exist, and therefore I can continue to feel confident that there is no individual responsible for things, but you can think there is one! ... The alter ego is somebody that has no background, has no childhood, has no real existence."

The existing article previously titled "Bonnie 'Prince' Billy" included a "background" section which described the background of the artist Will Oldham. According to Oldham, Bonnie "Prince" Billy has no background. Similarly, the article describes musical recordings attributed to Palace Brothers, Palace Records, Palace, and Will Oldham, among others. It also lists the filmography and other artistic works of Will Oldham. It would be incorrect to attribute any of these works to Bonnie "Prince" Billy. In addition, a 2018 collection of Oldham's lyrics, which included many works attributed to Bonnie "Prince" Billy, listed Will Oldham as its author..

To be entirely accurate, there should be separate articles for the various incarnations of Oldham's collaborative "Palace" project, as well as a separate article for the persona Bonnie "Prince" Billy. Nevertheless, the commonality behind all of these creations is the artist and living person Will Oldham.

All the best- Caerulescens (talk) 23:35, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

• Move but to Will Oldham as this is the primary topic (no WP:PARENDAB needed). His acting, other than voice roles, have been credited with his given name.--☾Loriendrew☽ ☏(ring-ring) 00:04, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Moving the article

Hello MB I agree that the article title should be "Will Oldham" rather than "Will Oldham (musician)" but my numerous attempts to move the article to "Will Oldham" were denied for some technical reason - the article "Will Oldham" already existed but redirected to "Bonnie 'Prince' Billy". I'm still learning how to operate on here, so if someone else (e.g. MB) would like to enact this change I would greatly appreciate the assistance.

In other words - my original intention was to change/move the article title from "Bonnie 'Prince' Billy" to "Will Oldham" but after many failed attempts to move the page I came up with the solution of creating a new article, titled "Will Oldham (musician)".

Thanks for your help MB! Caerulescens (talk) 15:08, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

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The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

References