“Right in Time” by Lucinda Williams

"Right in Time" was the first single from Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, Lucinda Williams's fifth album, released in 1998, and she wrote it alone. The credits are a roll call of roots-rock heavyweights: Gurf Morlix on electric guitar, Buddy Miller on acoustic, Ray Kennedy and Greg Leisz on 12-string, John Ciambotti on bass, Donald Lindley on drums and percussion, and Roy Bittan filling the cracks with Hammond organ, with Jim Lauderdale's voice twined around hers. Williams co-produced, and Rick Rubin and Jim Scott mixed it.

It's a slow-simmering, sun-warmed groove, all jangle and ache, and Williams sings it like she has all night. The song found second lives on the first-season soundtrack of Showtime's The L Word and on Sarah McLachlan's Artist's Choice compilation in 2004, where McLachlan picked it herself.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.