Lucinda Williams - World's Gone Wrong

Lucinda Williams has never flinched from hard truths, and World's Gone Wrong turns that unblinking gaze squarely on turbulent times.

Released in 2026, the album is one of the most openly topical records of her long career, building on the biting songs of Good Souls Better Angels with fresh urgency. Producers Ray Kennedy and Tom Overby captured it at Room & Board Studio in Nashville and Electric Lady Studios in New York, with a road-tested band featuring guitarists Doug Pettibone and Marc Ford giving the songs a raw, swaggering edge.

The title track "The World's Gone Wrong" sets the scene, her weathered drawl front and centre while Brittney Spencer adds soulful harmonies. A cover of Bob Marley's "So Much Trouble in the World" becomes a duet with Mavis Staples, two voices that have lived through plenty and still sound defiant. "How Much Did You Get for Your Soul?" asks the question at the heart of the record, and Norah Jones joins on piano and vocals for the closing "We've Come Too Far to Turn Around", a hard-won note of resolve.

Angry, tender and stubbornly hopeful, it is the work of an artist who still has plenty to say, and says it with grit.