Windy & Carl

songs for the broken hearted

this is an album about love. everyone has known love, and everyone has known loss. love is not just about warm fuzzy feelings, although that would be the part people say they like the best. and in any span of time, love changes and means different things to different people.

i never thought this would be an album. we started these recordings the same weekend i started I Hate People. it was a dark time, and when the tapes were taken off the reels i really thought that was the end of them. they were just going to sit and rot away somewhere.

but between christmas and new year of 2007, carl pulled them out and decided to finish them. he became obsessed with them somehow, i suppose in much the same way i had become obbsessed with finishing my own album earlier in the year. he worked every night for weeks, and as i wandered around the house i heard those songs everytime they played. and some of them made me cry, everytime. they sounded sad to me, because they were started in such a sad time. carl kept talking about wanting to have a new record out for 2008, and i told him only if it was named Songs For The Broken Hearted. he said fine, he just wanted it done.

so in early 2008 he gave me a cdr with what he felt were finished tracks, and asked me to write words for them. i had no ideas, i just kept crying when they were on. it really did not seem important to me to get them done because they only reminded me of things..........and then, one night, i started writing. i wrote words for 4 or 5 songs that night, and started singing the next evening. and we did rough mixes that i listened to for a week or so, and then i pulled out my journals, the gang of them that i had been filling since the fall of 2007, and i picked a few pieces that seemed like they would go with the music. i rerecorded some of the tracks with the new words, and resang some vocals i thought could be better. and the songs went from being all sad to being a reflection of how love works. how we are affected - by ourselves and others. how love makes you swoon and lonliness makes you cry. how when you love someone in this world you love them no matter where they are, and the connections you feel to and with them. love can make you blind, both when things are good and when they are not, and how do you react to being blind? what choices do you make and how do they change the world around you............

songs for the broken hearted is an album full of honesty, both musically and lyrically. it is for anyone who has felt love - you can hear it in the sounds and the words, both spoken and unspoken. the album i never thought would be is finished.

released on oct 13th, 2008 on kranky
all music windy and carl
all words windy
art by christy romanick and windy weber
mastered by war
graphic help by craig mccaffrey

live set from terrastock 7

In anticipation for the new release, we hope you enjoy the live recording made at this year's Terrastock festival. It is approximately an hour long and can be downloaded from the Kranky Podcast. All apologies for the sound interruptions.

i hate people

"At one time or another, in everyone's life, each one of us wants an island.....a place to be away from the rest of the world, a place where no one can hurt or betray us. This record is about that island."

It is comprised of two tracks - "Sirens," coming in at 24 minutes, is instrumental, and is filled with the sound of guitars crying, rising and falling like waves crashing on the rocks. Sirens is ominous, and haunting. It is not music to sleep to, but instead could make you tense and anxious.

The second track is "Destroyed." It is 32 minutes long, and comprised of 3 suites. The first being layers of vocals, woven together to make a chorus of breathing and breathlessness, layers to make you feel as if you may be drowning in the sea.....whether that sea be the ocean, or the sea of life, the day to day world in which you must deal. The second suite becomes noisy, agitated, rumbling and distorted guitars, bass and feedback, and makes you sit on the edge of your seat wondering what is about to happen. The third suite takes you to the end of the album with it's subsonic frequencies and strange unrecognizible sounds.

This is not music for the faint of heart. Windy's dear friend Jody found herself having to pull over while trying to listen to this in the car because it made her too tense. And kranky turned it down for release, feeling it was more suited for listeners of Nurse With Wound or Current 93. Born out of frustration and anger, I Hate People is the story of how in one's life, your car, your dog, a dead bird on the ground, are not going to be as upsetting or devastating to you as another human will be - only people can make you feel so bad. Only people can hurt you, betray you, and make you feel like you want to die. I Hate People is the expression born of real life, and real pain, and is an expression of emotion that is universally shared. At one point or another, we all want an island. But most of us will never get there.

I Hate People is now available on CD by Blueflea and on LP by Kenedik. The LP will be on limited (1000 copies) beautifully colored splatter vinyl (500 on clear with blue and green and purple splatter, and 500 on clear with blood red splatter), featuring a completely different mix and with a shorter length on each song so as to provide the best sound quality. Cover art features a wonderful selection of photos by Christy Romanick, Windy's dear friend and one of her favorite artists, and Windy's passport photo from 1987 - showing a very angry, young, punk rock beginning to this musician's career.

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