FROM BREAK-UPS TO BAR FIGHTS: WEDNESDAY’S BLEEDS CUTS DEEP
Horror and humor fuse together in the countrygaze band Wednesday’s sixth album, Bleeds. In true Southern Gothic fashion, Bleeds explores themes of grief and violence with bar fights, murder suicides and washed up bodies in the creek. Wednesday’s signature combination of lived-in storytelling, visceral noise, and a whole lot of heart creates a one-of-a-kind album that truly lives, breathes and bleeds.
Hailing from North Carolina, Wednesday is made up of Karly Hartzman (vocals, guitar), MJ Lenderman (guitar, backing vocals), Xandy Chelmis (pedal steel), Alan Miller (drums), and Ethan Baechtold (bass). Following their breakthrough album Rat Saw God, Wednesday conjured up Bleeds amidst the end of Hartzman and Lenderman’s romantic relationship, creating an intimate and mature album that gushes like a freshly opened wound.
Graphic by Haley Petrone (Crave Music Magazine)
The lead single, “Elderberry Wine,” is a timeless and tender country-influenced song with just the right amount of twang. The song reflects on how when a relationship isn’t fostered properly, sweetness can turn to poison, much like misprepared elderberry wine. When Hartzman and Lenderman sing the chorus together, their words hang in the air like a cloud of sweet perfume before dissipating into the feedback of Chelmis’s pedal steel.
“The Way Love Goes” echoes a similar sentiment of a relationship gone spoilt and stale. While “Elderberry Wine” remains hopeful, “The Way Love Goes” finds Hartzman accepting the fated end of the relationship, crooning:
“There’s women less / Spoiled by your knowing / Newer and much sweeter / Many much more patient / With much more than I can give”
However, Bleeds isn’t a break-up album. Hartzman treats her home of North Carolina and its cast of familiar characters as her muse, affectionately painting a portrait of Southern Americana one detail at a time, finding humor and tragedy in the mundane. Hartzman approaches these stories with a sense of tenderness and verbose morbidity.
The stories told on Bleeds range from small-town gossip to gut-wretching tragedies. “Gary’s II,” a sequel to Wednesday’s Twin Plagues track “Gary’s,” is one of these affectionate stories, starring Hartzman’s oddball late landlord. Over a bluegrass instrumental powered by Chelmis’ plucky pedal steel, Hartzman lays out the true story of how Gary lost his teeth after becoming accidentally involved in a bar fight.
The light, bouncy tribute contrasts the sullen “Carolina Murder Suicide” before it, inspired by a true crime podcast following the story of the Murdaugh Murders that took place in South Carolina in 2021. Here, Wednesday examines the effects of grief on a community over a fuzzy guitar and gentle piano, singing:
“And I wondered if grief could break you in half / When the gossip died / And the ruins rotted away in the rain / And the fruit flies went to sleep in the drain”
Wednesday seamlessly sews together hazy guitar distortion with plucky twang. Bleeds is a push-pull between two genres; one second Lenderman’s guitar is heavy and sludgy (à la My Bloody Valentine), next it’s a sunny, honeyed country riff, both equally sticky. “Phish Pepsi,” a track that would fit on Beck’s Mellow Gold, is followed by the shoegaze song “Candy Breath,” with distorted guitars that pulsate like the flickering refrigerator light cast on the character in the song. Hartzman’s vocal shines through, with vocal cracks and flips like a yodel. By the time the listener reaches the feral, hardcore “Wasp,” it feels jarring, but not out of place as Hartzman’s voice turns to full-on cathartic screams.
