But part of the thrill of Urban Driftwood is how untethered Williams sounds to any tradition whatsoever: She has a gift for penning melodies that feel as catchy as pop songs, as in the lightly descending refrain of вЂњJuvenescence,вЂќ but her approach to the instrument also allows her to confound expectations, making you question the source of each overtone and rhythm. WilliamsвЂ™ songwriting fits into an ongoing trend of instrumental music that more closely recalls the new age-leaning mood music of the Windham Hill label than the droning, pastoral fingerstyle approach of figureheads like John Fahey. Pensive and bittersweet, the mood can recall William TylerвЂ™s sonic storytelling or Mary LattimoreвЂ™s serene harp experiments. She has described the album as an abstract diary of her year in 2020: Opening with the light optimism of вЂњSunshowers,вЂќ it darkens into knottier, more contemplative material over the course of 10 songs. It is more focused and fleshed out than its predecessor, with Williams complimenting her acoustic guitar playing with West African instruments like the kora and djembe. While WilliamsвЂ™ 2018 debut Unwind felt like a showcase for her versatility as a guitarist, her second album, Urban Driftwood, presents her more fully as a composer. It is this talent that allows her to, say, cover a Swae Lee and Post Malone song, and have it sound as natural and spellbinding as her own work. Her smooth and immersive playing belies the complexity below the surface. The 24-year-old is not only a skilled technician but also an instinctive songwriter, penning memorable compositions that, even at their most open-ended, proceed in a loose verse-chorus structure. But the power of her music is its immediacy. WilliamsвЂ™ inventive style, which has also involved wearing tap shoes and taking a cello bow to her instrument, has made her stand out in the field of solo guitarists. Without an accompanist, she attached a kalimba-a type of thumb piano-at the bottom of her instrument, plucking it with her right hand while her left navigated the strings. Drawing from a love of hip-hop, she sought an underlying rhythm throughout her wordless, melodic compositions. Unable to replicate their style, she laid the guitar on her lap, tuned the strings in harmony with each other, and played it like a keyboard. Drawn to the instrument after mastering Guitar Hero 2, she dreamed of tapping along the fretboard like rock virtuosos before her. Yasmin Williams has described her approach to acoustic guitar as a kind of creative problem-solving.

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