Wednesday and how contemporary rock can reinvent themselves

Released on 19 September, the new and sixth album of Wednesday entitled “Bleeds“, already represents the Center of a wider speech on the ability of contemporary rock to reinvent itself Without stopping digging in the roots, mixing personal memories, sound landscapes of the American province and the dark lyricism of the Southern Gothic tradition. In just seven days from the exit, the album captured the attention of criticism and fans, confirming how the singer -songwriter and musician Karly Hartzman succeeds with his band a combine emotional tension, lived life stories and the vigor of an authentic sound It is viscerally American.

The history of the Wednesday has its roots in the second half of the two thousand and ten in AshevilleNorth Carolina, as Hartzman’s solo project, and then evolved in 2020 in the stable formation that we know today, with the entry of the singer -songwriter and guitarist MJ Lenderman, the bassist Ethan Baechtold, the drummer Alan Miller and the polystrumentist Xandy Chelmis. The band’s journey is marked by an intense musical growth, which started by the Lo-Fi reverbs of the first self-produced album “Yep Definitell” of 2018 and the next “I Was Trying to Descirbe You To Someone”, and arrived at the consecration with “Rat Saw God” of 2023 (here our review), which collected enthusiastic reviews and was celebrated by international magazines such as “Consequence” or “Pitchfork” for the best album of the year.

Even on a personal level, the band has gone through moments of transformation: The separation between Hartzman and Lendermanwhich took place during the processing of “Bleeds”, he left emotional and creative traces on the disc, with songs such as the first single “Elderberry Wine” and the track “The Way Love Goes” that tell sentimental tensions and fragility. By drawing a similarity with the Fleetwood Mac, as underlined by “Pitchfork”, which in his review of “Bleeds” praises the album as “Best New Music” and assigns a vote of 8.7 out of 10, Hartzman transforms breakage into creative energykeeping the musical collaboration with Lenderman in the studio. “We recorded the album a month after having left us and after an exhausting tour for ‘Rat Saw God’, which had been fantastic for the band’s dynamics, but I had reached the limit for the exhaustion,” Karly said in an interview for the American edition of “Rolling Stone”: “But I think I am more proud of this that we have done anything else so far”.

Musically, “Bleeds” is a Balance between contrast and cohesionin which abrasive moments of songs such as “Wasp” coexist with the sweetness of “Elderberry Wine”. “I am fascinated by the practice, typical of the country, to have timeless standards that are recorded and re -engraved by other artists, that process a little at Nashville. I wanted to write something that could be considered timeless,” said Karly Hartzman talking about “Elderberry Wine”: “but” but ” A love song manages to be a timeless song if you write it welland it was what I hoped to get. I believe that a well -made love song must admit even the darkest aspects of Amare someone, the compromises that must be done and the most embarrassing desires or hopes. The goal was to enclose all this. In the studio I arrive only with my guitar and my words. I would say that, on a thematic level, I always have very clear ideas, but my companions help me build the sound structure that supports the texts. The part of Xandy in the refrain is the best example, with Pedal Steel. And the way it uses feedback is very emotional. I think the Feedback is a little exploited sound To convey emotion in many genres, especially in the country “.

Songs like “Carolina Murder Suicide” and “Townies” bring to the surface the taste for US Gothic literature and highlight Hartzman’s ability of transform private episodes and fragments of popular culture in sound frescoes. The musician draws from memories to poetry books and even from podcasts on crime: “During the pandemic I was obsessed with murdered murders, because it is a particularly compelling story”, said Karly on “Carolina Murder Suicide”: “I said to myself: ‘Cabbage, if I am about to dedicate 17 hours of my life to listen to a podcast on this story, at least I have to get a song. sort of interpretation from the point of view of a girl who lived on the other side of the road, as an observer “. This also creates a dialogue with the American Indie Rock tradition, from Sonic Youth to Pavement, and letting himself influence from songwriters such as Lucinda Williams and Richard Buckner. It is a writing that He is not afraid of getting dirty with Quotidiano, who knows how to be as cruel as it is tenderand which finds a constantly unstable but magnetic balance in the sound landscape of Wednesday.

A week after the exit, already collecting praise that raising him to “probable rock disco of the year”, “Bleeds” certainly confirms Wednesday as one of the essential bands of this time. Listening to the album, even the desire to see the group livein action on a stage. With the release of the new and sixth album, the opportunity to see the band in concert arrives for Italy: the Wednesday will debut live in Italy for a single date of the tour set for theFebruary 11, 2026 at the ARC beauty of Milan.