(SOUNDBITE OF WEDNESDAY SONG, "PICK UP THAT KNIFE")
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
There's a tragic and almost literary feel to the latest album from the indie rock band Wednesday.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "PICK UP THAT KNIFE")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Cracked my tooth on a cough drop. Winter stuck around after it's gone. Grocery store on Christmas. Parked too close to someone to get out
SIMON: The album is called "Bleeds," and the band explores nostalgia, heartbreak and violence. Karly Hartzman is the vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter for the group. She joins us now. Thanks so much for being with us.
KARLY HARTZMAN: Yeah. Thanks for having me.
SIMON: I understand you call this album Southern Gothic in its approach. How so?
HARTZMAN: It felt like the easiest way to maybe classify what I'm doing, and also speak to my interest in reading other authors and listening to other music that does this Southern thing. But it's mostly just the thing I had the most access to that already exists.
SIMON: What writers are we talking about?
HARTZMAN: I mean, I'm really into, like, Harry Crews - he's a Florida writer - and people kind of adjacent to that world. A lot of the, like, Oxford, Mississippi, guys, Larry Brown and Barry Hannah and stuff like that - the tragic, drunk, funny dudes from the South.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GARY'S II")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) You went to the dentist, and he winced at your gums. And he said that false teeth were your only option. You said, go ahead, man. Just take out the rest. Even the good ones are doomed. I'm tired of them"
SIMON: Where do the lyrics come from?
HARTZMAN: Kind of all over. I kind of blend across, like, a tonal space. Like, I've put together stories from my family's life, my own life, that I just really don't want to get lost, but I mix them up with, like, the plots of a movie. And then I just kind of blend it in my own taste and details from my modern life.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WOUND UP HERE (BY HOLDIN ON)")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Scratch-off ticket for the education lottery. Found him drowned in the creek. Face was puffy. They hung his dirty jersey up in a trophy case next to his girlfriend in a picture with a varsity face.
HARTZMAN: Yeah, I feel like I just pick up stuff people say all the time and write it down. I'm kind of always searching for stuff to throw in.
SIMON: You do that in front of people?
HARTZMAN: I don't, like, 'cause I don't want my friends to get self-conscious or, like, adjust how they're speaking around me, so I'll do it sneakily.
SIMON: Tell us about the song "Wound Up Here (By Holdin On)."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WOUND UP HERE (BY HOLDIN ON)")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Holding on. I would up here by holding on.
HARTZMAN: That one started with me really wanting to tell the story of my friend who's a raft guide in West Virginia. On Halloween one year, he had to go out in front of a rafting race because they were waiting for a body to surface from a creek. And he wanted to make sure to get out ahead and make sure it was not going to be surfacing around for a bunch of people to see.
SIMON: Let me ask you about some of the tender moments on this album...
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "ELDERBERRY WINE")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Sweet song is a long con. I drove you to the airport with the e-brake on.
SIMON: ..."Elderberry Wine" and "The Way Love Goes." You send some longing in those songs. Am I right?
HARTZMAN: I wrote both of those songs for my at-the-time partner and collaborator, Jake Lenderman. He plays guitar on this record. The songs knew before I knew myself that that relationship was ending. And I think "Elderberry Wine" was me trying to put myself back in, like, a loving space with him, telling him I wanted to have his kids and all the reasons we were meant to be together.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "ELDERBERRY WINE")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) But everybody gets along just fine 'cause the champagne tastes like elderberry. wine. And the pink boiled eggs stay afloat in the brine 'cause even the best champagne still tastes like elderberry wine.
HARTZMAN: By the time I wrote "The Way Love Goes," I was accepting that we weren't going to end up together, for all the reasons people don't usually end up together.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE WAY LOVE GOES")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Knocking on that screen door, even though I can see right through. Feel like I'm almost good enough to know you.
HARTZMAN: We had been broken up by the time we recorded those songs. So it was a interesting journey, to say the least.
SIMON: I recognize it's none of my business, but I got to ask - how does he feel about those songs?
HARTZMAN: We're still really good friends. Both of us care about songs more than anything. So I think he recognizes that a song we feel proud of is going to be a comfortable thing to share, even if it puts us in a vulnerable space.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE WAY LOVE GOES")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) There's women with less.
SIMON: Course, many of these songs and stories are about life in small-town North Carolina. Maybe medium-sized North Carolina. What should we know about life there?
HARTZMAN: It's funny 'cause I think to, like, someone who lives in New York City, it's small-town. But, yeah, for a North Carolinian, it's medium-town for sure, where I live in Asheville and Greensboro. But, yeah. I guess especially in today's climate, where I think the South is, for good reason, being kind of - the spectrum of what people think we can be as residents here is shrinking because our - I feel like this region represents a lot of the hatred and terrible things about this country right now. But there's so much dimension to people's lives here and so much love and fight and this Southern thing that encapsulates so much more than the aggression. And there's people here who care and love, and a million different lives exist here. And it's maybe not what you would assume having if you had never been or hung around here.
SIMON: Karly Hartzman of the band Wednesday, and their new album is called "Bleeds." Thanks so much for taking the time to speak with us.
HARTZMAN: Yeah. Thanks for having me. It was awesome.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "CANDY BREATH")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Broken nose piercer.
SIMON: I have to ask. Do you know BJ Leiderman? He's an Ashevillian.
HARTZMAN: He did the intro music for NPR, right?
SIMON: He does our music.
WEDNESDAY: Yeah, I'm familiar. I've never met him, but I'm - I know who he is.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "CANDY BREATH")
WEDNESDAY: (Singing) Guzzle it down at midnight in the fridge light. Gather round the fighting cage. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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