'Traversing the Cosmic Swamp of Wednesday,' for Tn2 Magazine issue 4, April 2024
Wednesday was formed in Asheville, North Carolina, in 2017. What started as lead singer/guitarist Karly Hartzman's solo project, the band expanded to include members guitarist MJ Lenderman (who recently released an incredible live solo album 'And the Wind (Live and Loose!)), lap/pedal steel player Xandy Chelmis, bassist Ethan Baechtold, and drummer Alan Miller. Wednesday's body of work transports the listener across a wide range of sonic experiences, meshing the heart-wrenching tenderness of a classic country ballad with the driving raucousness of grungy fuzz-pedal laden shoegaze. Karly's wistful vocals act as a guide and tether through the shifting instrumentals, weaving semi-autobiographical, hyper-literary tales of growing up in the American South. What stands out about Wednesday's work is its striking sense of emotional earnestness: whatever story is being professed through each song, its feelings, characters, and memories are treated with a respecful and relatable nostalgia seeping with sentimentality. This ethos is perhaps best defined by a line from their song What's So Funny: "Memory always twists the kife / nothing will ever be as vivid / as the darkest / time of my life."
2023 was, undoubtedly, a huge year for Wednesday. They released their fifth studio album, Rat Saw God, in April. Rat Saw God sees Wednesday at their most polished, featuring gorgeously produced tracks about being electrocuted during band practice (Got Shocked), hooking up in parked cars after teaching at Sunday School (Chosen to Deserve), and the eight-minute and thirty-second epic Bull Believer, which tackles themes of alcoholism, the search for self-induced divinity, and bloodhsed; that finalises in a guttural and cathartic screamed refrain of "FINISH HIM!!!!!" The album was released to instant critical acclaim. It received an 8.8 on Pitchfork and the coveted Best New Music title. It featured prominently on end-of-year best album roundups from NME, Stereogum, and Rolling Stone. The year saw Wednesday's first two international tours, as well as a performance at Barcelona's Primavera Sound festival. This year, the band is booked to play in Australia, New Zealand, and Japan, as well as another U.S. tour.
Tn2's Francis and Ciara went to the so-called 'alt-county' band Wednesday's gig in Opium. The audience was filled with a surprising mix of millennial men, wannabe cowboy Irish, and evidently, student journalists. They got to talking with the band after a fantastically intense show with an incredibly confusing crowd. Sweating profusely after moshing for an hour, and nervous with the reality of meeting some rock legends, Ciara and Francis had a few questions for the band's frontperson, Karly Hartzman. This is what she had to say.
On your recent album Rat Saw God, your songs have a very strong narrative thread. Are you inspired by any specific literary works or authors?
Flannery O'Connor is a big one for me right now. I've been reading her collection 'Everything That Rises Must Converge.' Her stuff turns out 1000% darker than I think it's gonna. I think that's just so invigorating considering the time she was publishing these stories. Richard Braughtigan is also always gonna be an author I worship. He's the writer that will stick with me for my whole life I think. George Saunders has been a big one for me recently as well. I find short stories as a format just really satisfying at the moment.
Karly, how do you think your textile work and visual art making process compares to the songwriting process? Where do they differ?
My visual art is mostly just a way to still express myself and be creative without putting all the pressure on music. I can write when I feel like it, and not write when I don't have the right energy. I can pretty much see whenever 'cause it's more methodical. I feel the same sense of accomplishment doing both!
In your rockumentary, Rat Bastards of Haw Creek (2023), Alan says that you guys are a "gamer band." What games are your favourites, and who typically wins? Who's the most competitive?
Alan is possibly the most competitive in a quiet way. Xandy is the most competitive in a very loud way. Ethan's probably the best all around at gaming though. They like Zelda and Smash and MarioKart a lot. Alan plays a lot of strategy city building games, Ethan likes more emotionally driven stuff than the other boys, like Stardew Valley etc. I definitely play games marketed to my demographic, ha. A lot of farming simulators and story driven stuff. I just finished a game called "Potion Permit."
Wednesday, in recent years, has been touring extensively. What is your process of creating home and finding North Carolina in strange places?
I'm still figuring that out I think. There's truly nowhere that feels like home because a lot of that feeling comes from our friends that live there with us. I think that's the balance we're gonna be trying out the next couple of years. We wanna be home as much as possible ideally. Still wanna play shows of course but we need time at home to keep making new music.
How does the experience of touring change from within the U.S. to abroad? We saw you've recently been booked to tour in Australia and Japan. What is the logistic process behind booking those shows like?
Hahah no idea. Luckily I'm not in charge of booking shows. I just go where out manager/booking agent tells us. I booked all our tours the first couple years of the band, it was the hardest part of the job genuinely. I was not very good at it. But year, touring abroad is hard because it's nearly impossible to get over jet lag when your sleeping schedule is so messed up. Also the audiences here are very different. Most cities kind of act like they're watching a play when we're on stage. Dublin was different though. Y'all rocked.
In your documentary, Xandy mentioned that one of your early goals / embodiment of success as a band was "to play big old shows and not have to work a lame job, and kick it with your friends all the time." How have your goals changed with the evolution of the band?
Now that we can sustain outselves financially I think our goals mostly are just like, keep making music, stay healthy and don't let anyone or anything take the joy out of what we're doing. Luckily we all adore playing music, it's the highlight of our night. That's the thing we want the most, to just conserve this love we have for music.
Additionally, what aspects of your sound do you feel have changed the most over time?
We're better at communicating wordlessly what we want stuff to sound like. It is a bond that's kind of hard to put into words. Really magic.
I (Francis) got to see you guys at the Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn this past summer, and I was very taken by the emotional impact of your performance. It was a very cathartic experience as an audience member, and I can imagine that this translates to playing as a band. How does this emotional energy differ from recording in the studio to playing live?
Well in the studio it's a little more methodical... so it is emotional but really you're just trying to create a version of the emotion that is fit to live forever on an album. Live we can do pretty much whatever I want, and the emotion has more to do with day to day feelings rather than the original feeling I was trying to communicate with the recording.
How do you conjure the energy for live performances? Do you have any pre-show rituals / routines?
We do a vocal warm up and drink alcohol, ha. Just usually the excitement that we get to play a show is enough! It's what the whole day of travel, soundcheck, and everything has led to.
The Anerican South and Irish culture are similar in their veneration and appreciation of folk and country music. Last year Garth Brooks played a five night residency at Croke Park that sold over 400,000 tickets. How do you feel that the revitalisation and reinterpretation of traditional music lends itself to a cultural lineage?
I think people are just really interested in the effects of tradition in general right now. Like everything is so ephemeral with the internet or whatever, so I think something so grounded in a place and time is satisfying to hear. Also just having something that displays a sense of pride of where you are from is really underrated.
What's unique to you about the North Carolina music scene, how does it differ from other music scenes around America?
It's always changing, honestly, and I'm not really home enough to have a firm grasp on where it's at right now necessarily. But, I do think that one of the important things is that it's more affordable than most big cities to live in NC. And where there is accessibility to resources and practice space and house show venues, there is usually great music.