If a throughline exists in the decade of Squirrel Flower’s repertoire, it’s a projection of time and place. A ‘Squirrel Flower song’ is, if anything, a snapshot of Chicago-based songwriter Ella Williams’ feelings in a given moment, extrapolated into a character, or a train of thought, or a (super)natural phenomenon. Of her fourth studio album released by Polyvinyl Records (and sixth full-length to date), Say A Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going, Williams describes each song as a living archive of a moment or a place, given the space to live on its own outside of the forceful progression of time. 

The transcendent title track begins where 2023’s Tomorrow’s Fire leaves off. Both spacious and thunderous, it’s a meditation on movement and stasis, future and past, delivered with a power that verges on mystical. This is where Say a Prayer stands out as a singular and monumental classic. In crafting a collage of landscapes and characters (Williams wrote over thirty songs in the process), she skillfully weaves together a timeless love album. Just as the generational richness of Williams’ voice cuts through each track’s darkness or playfulness, so does an unmistakable depth of feeling. Love for friends, for landscape, for relentless touring, for her own ideas and feelings, for life itself, for some elusive lover Williams chases to each of her stops along the road. 

Spanning 2024 and 2025, the writing process for Say A Prayer is an account of the locations and the characters Williams encountered as she traveled across vast American biomes: “Canyons of New Mexico / Factories of Indiana / Bunkers of California / Harbors of New England calling / She ends up in borderlands / She ends up in familiar places.” Williams chronicles the changing landscapes of a solo traveller, untethered to anyone or anything other than the experience itself, and bolstered by a vast network of friends and companions.

Tracked live at makeshift studio Merry Meadow in Door County, WI with a cast of Chicago music heads including co-producers Seth Engel and Jack Henry, and later painstakingly refined and rerecorded to perfection in Asheville, NC at Alex Farrar’s Drop of Sun studios, Say a Prayer’s production mirrors its songwriting process. In addition to Dave Hartley (The War on Drugs) and Seth Kauffman (Angel Olsen), both of whom played on Williams’ 2023 album Tomorrow’s Fire, Williams enlisted a cast of friends including Dimitri Giannopolous (Horse Jumper of Love), Sofia Jensen (Free Range), Clay Frankel (Twin Peaks), Andy Krull (Red PK), Book not Brooke (Babywave), and even family members Jameson, Jesse, and Nate Williams. 

Farrar, a producer known for a prolific indie rock sound (Wednesday, MJ Lenderman), surprised Williams by amplifying the quietest, most delicate aspects of her music. “He was encouraging me to lean into this ethereal, yet grounded, spacious yet textured folk music that’s so true to the early days of Squirrel Flower,” Williams states. “It felt like a breakthrough.” Exemplified by the sparkling acoustic arrangement of 12-string guitars, recorder, and accordion on lead single “Reelin,” Williams envelops herself in a shimmering and timeless sound inspired by legendary wild-women Stevie Nicks, Linda Ronstadt, and Joni Mitchell. Williams herself draws from the independent spirits of her heroes, setting scenes both domestic and cosmic, “Trash on Sunday, boy in the yard”—before letting her love and the road take her where they will: “‘Til bad things call me back again.”

This energy deepens with “Not Me,” a heartland rock single emerging from a dream Williams had one night in New Mexico, in which the subtleties of her voice demand room to shine. “I’d been listening to Linda Ronstadt so much when I wrote it,” says Williams, “and I think that really came through. I wanted to just sing.” Ringing with the tensions of desire and independence, the heartfelt track follows the pop effortlessness of “Cleveland.” Co-written with Ella’s sibling Nate, a first for the typically solo songwriter, “Cleveland” toys with a classic love story in the context of the unmoored angst held by so many young people: “It’s a love song, but she’s choosing the city over the boy,” says Williams.
 
Halfway through the tracklist lies “Highway Woman,” the thematic heart of the album. Somewhere between autobiography and fiction, the song earnestly displays Williams’ commitment to a creative life and to the process of creation itself. “I’m singing about myself, to myself, but also to and about every wild person who lives on the margins, on the wind, on the road, who flirts with immortality through art and restlessness.” Williams navigates a bohemian lifestyle in an era that refuses to accommodate it, and catalogues her life in an attempt to grasp some form of independence and immortality: “She’ll never be yours and yours alone / She doesn’t plan on dying.” The recording captures Williams’ voice with newfound clarity; she has never sounded so much like herself. Layers of acoustic guitars draw in and comfort weary listeners as guitarist Andy Krull’s crooning beckons them back out to the road. 

In many ways, Say A Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going is about itself, about the process of its creation on the road. That isn’t to say that Say a Prayer is a travelogue. It’s more of a bittersweet testament to exploration and self-possession, longing and musing. Vividly personal, it’s like a set of abandoned scrapbooks filled with ephemera, harvested from the side of the dusty freeway by some highway woman over her decades, piled up in a banker’s box in a backyard shed, tenuously protected from a desert monsoon. Past experiences lovingly chronicled, the future remains open for Williams as she hopes for a sign to help her know when to get going and when to stay still. “And this life is free / ‘You gotta take what you can get’ / Not me”.

All songs written by Ella Williams except “Cleveland,” written by Ella Williams & Nate Williams.
Vocal harmony on “Highway Woman” co-written by Seth Engel.

Recorded at Merry Meadow (Door County, WI) and Drop of Sun (Asheville, NC)

Produced by Ella Williams, Alex Farrar, Seth Engel & Jack Henry Lickerman

Engineered by Alex Farrar, Seth Engel & Jack Henry Lickerman
Assistant Engineer: Lawson Alderson
Additional Engineering on “Surfing USA”: Eric Kilburn at Wellspring Sound Studio

Mixed by Alex Farrar
Mastered by Bob Weston

MUSICIANS

Ella Williams (all tracks) — voice, guitar, Fender Rhodes, accordion, recorder, percussion

Alex Farrar (Say a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going, Cleveland, Not Me, Highway Woman, Reelin, Surfing USA, Weightless, Untethered) — bass, guitar, drums, piano, keys, percussion

Seth Engel (Say a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going, Helicopters, Foot Thick Ice, Sick Tooth) — bass, drums

Jack Henry Lickerman (Say a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going, Helicopters) — drums

Andy Krull (Cleveland, Not Me, Helicopters, Highway Woman, Foot Thick Ice, Sick Tooth) — guitar

Dave Hartley (Not Me, Highway Woman, Fought a Hornet, Weightless, Untethered) — bass

Nate Williams (Cleveland, Not Me) — voice

Dimitri Giannopoulos (Cleveland, Not Me) — guitar

Clay Frankel (Not Me, Reelin) — viola, voice

Sofia Jensen (Helicopters, Foot Thick Ice) — Fender Rhodes

Jameson Williams (Not Me) — guitar

Seth Kauffman (Not Me) — guitar

Chris Simmons (Not Me) — drums

Book Not Brooke (Fought a Hornet) — cello

Jesse Williams (Weightless, Untethered) — bass