"I mix a lot more electronics and rock with my urban influences on this record, " she receals. Skeptics may cock an eyebrow when Willa cites nonconformist icons like Bjork and Radiohead among her favorite artists, but the more sophisticated grooves of her new effort substantiates those words of praise. "The arrangements on this new record are not normal," she admits. "There are lots of very strange harmonies, things that are trick for a normal person to pick out." Instead of hiring outside singers, Willa arranged and sang the backing vocals herself. "I do all the orchestrations myself, too. That way, nobody can take my sound...unless I arrange for them."

When Willa Ford talks about "her" sound, she means it literally. While other artists are content to rely on hired guns, Willa took charge of the making of the new labum, limiting herself to just two collaborators - Toby Gad (Sita, Jaci Velasquez) and Willa Was Here vet Eve Nelson - and working in small studios, maintaining an emphasis on refining her uniqe sonic identity. "Did I ask for producers who get ,000 to produce a song? No. They get that money because they've created a sound, and it's their sound. I don't want their sound. Their sound is not going to help me grow as a person." Willa began writing these songs while touring in support of Willa Was Here, working in a small mobile studio in the back of the bus. She took inspiration from a variety of sources; the salacious first single, "A Toast To Men" - featuring the rapid-fire patter of special guest May - borrows its infectious hook from a classica sorority chang. "It's an old toast in sororities," she explains. "Almost all sorority girls, from some day and age know it." It dawned on Willa that its four simple, spirited lines represented and eduring artifact of female empowerment that hadn't been grossly overexposed or grown dated. "It was something that was still real and contemporary, but women who were 40-years old could remember it, too." Read More...