Choosing Cleveland over a crush is a pleasingly stubborn premise for a song. On “Cleveland,” Ella Williams gives a city the kind of loyalty usually reserved for the person someone is driving towards. The Squirrel Flower songwriter made it with her family band, uncommon rat. Romance can wait; there are other attachments to account for.
Say a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going came out on August 21, Williams’ fourth studio album for Polyvinyl. She wrote during travels in 2024 and 2025, recorded live in Door County, Wisconsin with Seth Engel and Jack Henry, then continued work at Alex Farrar’s Drop of Sun studio in Asheville.
Michael La Torre’s AltRevue review picks out “Foot Thick Ice” for the contrast between its restrained verses and heavily distorted chorus, and “Not Me” for the late arrival of pedal steel. That combination has a history in Williams’ catalogue. Tomorrow’s Fire, released in 2023, brought her songwriting into contact with a much louder band; Post-Trash’s Layton Guyton heard everyday domestic details rubbing against moments of devotion.
Cleveland gives that road-bound writing a particular attachment. Choosing a city over a crush is funny because it redirects the familiar romantic journey: the destination matters in its own right. Beside an album title concerned with getting going, it suggests that travelling can also be a way of returning to somewhere you want to be.
The WISE Hall bill pairs Squirrel Flower with Sour Widows. La Torre’s account of Foot Thick Ice, with its restrained verses and distorted chorus, gives a concrete reason to follow Williams beyond the image of a solitary songwriter on the road. She writes about attachment and departure while making room for the volume of a band. The sad song does not have to stay quiet.