Waxahatchee - Cerulean Salt

Her pronounced Dylanisms on the new album are charming, even if the songs are a bit samey; I tend to like her best when she aims for a bigger sound, as on the last album. "Lilacs" is the immediate standout, for me.

i think this is -- for now -- my favorite band. it's crazy, all of a sudden (last five years lol) they aren't a newish group, but a band with a formidable back catalog i can tap into whenever i want, which is everyday.

"can't do much" is one of the great love songs of all time, i think. this verse:

When you're missing me or what you see
Something wild that you think you'll never be
Something safe that you could tend to and lead
Something versatile to fill all your needs

in other hands, this would be a troubling, maybe cynical sort-of-psychoanalytic insight--that people really fall in love with an idea rather than a person. specifically, they fall in love with the idea that the beloved will compensate for the things they lack in themselves.

but she pivots. she knows this is part of love, this play of projections, but it's not something to lament. it's how people are, and the reason they can come to feel they need one another. or something like that. there's something to think about here.

Maybe I give it to you all on a dime
I love you til the day I
Love you til the day I
Love you til the day I
Love you til the day I die
I guess it don't matter why

"fire" is equally good. st. cloud is just a tremendous album.

her best

I didn't really spent too much time with this album at first because i figured it was too "happy" and "bright" for my miserable ass at the start of the pandemic, but I've really come around to it in the past month or so. It's her best since Cerulean Salt

it's a hard won "brightness" though. doesn't feel trite.

but i agree with you. i thought i would miss the darkness of the earlier stuff.

hard-won brightness is a good way to put it!

her songwriting has gotten so good. i say this as someone who always loved her stuff, but she is now writing songs that are as subtle and well-realized as it gets. in the pantheon imo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEyYlyRr2_U

like, just listen to this:

I take it for granted
If I could love you unconditionally
I could iron out the edges of the darkest sky
For some of us it ain't enough
It ain't enough
And I take off driving
Past places been tainted
I put on a good show for you
And when I turn back around
Will you drain me back out
Will you let me believe that I broke through?

alfred, which poet was it who said that the best poems feel like a memory? like you're seeing, reflected back to you, and crystalized, the best of what you've ever thought? something you'd forgotten

whoever that was, i think they were otm and i think these songs have it. nothing feels forced or false and nothing seems simple either.

Thread revive inspired me to listen to Ivy Tripp again - still her best imo.

what about the blinding greatness of "Singer's No Star" though?

Mostly all the time will go to you
Coming up for air for all the people who
recognize the sadness in a stranger with less to lose

We get comfortable with our detachment to our oldest friends
And you got me here where I'm left alone
I'm not the only thing you ever left

If I were to spoil a victory
or accept all of your trust and praise in spite of me
Will you recognize the failure in my voice before I leave?

We sit on a crowded ship
It's not the ending that's the tragic part
If you'd get off my shoulders and sit beside me we would both be fine

Lovely song and masterful lyrics, I agree.

Btw—on the cover of Ivy Tripp is she standing in a field of poison ivy?

and the lilacs drink the water
and the lilacs die
and the lilacs drink the water
marking the slow
slow
slow passing of time

I've really never listened to this band, but every time I came across a song, either in the wild or on shuffle or on some playlist, I've thought it was lovely. So tonight I played them for the first time (on shuffle) and boy, it's all so great. But it went through this particularly captivating streak of songs, first a cover of "Country Roads" (lovely), then Big Star's "Thirteen" (always lovely), then their own "Fire" (incredible) and then "Streets of Philadelphia," which killed me dead.

she is an exceptionally good songwriter. "fire" is unbelievable.

fuck me American Weekend is nine years old already

i love saint cloud, it’s fucking good as hell

I was just lukewarm on Waxahatchee all these years and lost track of her output a while ago, but was convinced to check out St. Cloud when it started showing up on various EOY lists. Easily one of my favorite albums of the last 2-3 years.

Saint Cloud is great, but I think American Weekend is still unsurmountable masterpiece.

exactly same, pgwp

i'd probably need to give em all a listen again but I think Out of the Storm is my favourite, though about half the tracks on Cerulean Salt are downright friggin amazing

I really like Saint Cloud but it sort of fell off my listening rotation. Fire is amazing, but -- and this is more of a personal preference than a genuine criticism -- I find I cant relate to the warm vibe of it that much? maybe i just need to brighten up, but the angst and tension in her previous records are what really grab me.

also, katie is one of the few artists whose autograph I have and I take pride in that. (an autographed copy of ivy tripp from 2015, specifically). but ah, asking an artist for an autograph is such an awkward experience.

I thought she was hella boring for years. Then Saint Cloud impressed me. At Pitchfork she made me hear how many of those songs are variations on "Sweet Jane" chords to my ears.

I fiercely love every one of her albums. St Cloud is the least melancholy. There is hard won hope in it.

New album coming under the name Plains, a duo with Jess Williamson. First song is great.

https://www.stereogum.com/2194397/plains-katie-crutchfield-jess-williamson-problem-with-it/music/amp/

I’m not familiar with Williamson, so giving her most recent solo album a spin.

that's a great little song, thanks for the heads up

My fanboy love for Waxahatchee coupled with my unfamiliarity with Jess Williamson is making it hard to get into the new Plains album. The non-Waxahatchee songs are fine but I have an urge to hit the skip button each time. I know I’m being unfair but I haven’t gotten over that feeling yet

Yeah. Same.

«Swan Dive» still kills me on the reg

Yay she's back! I was immune to the Jess Williamson and Plains stuff, and honestly to Waxa pre-Saint Cloud, but Saint Cloud is one of my favourite records of the decade.

Excited to hear this new one - the instrumentation's a bit formulaic, but love the sound of her and MJ Lenderman's voices on the first single

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL3iHhERWJw

Yesssssss

St. Cloud is my favorite album of the decade so far. Four years later I’m still not tired of it. New one sounds great.

St. Cloud rules. This is good, too.

Her Substack is emailed to me, which is weird--I never signed up for anything. I bought something from Bandcamp once, maybe they take your e-mail from there and just send it to you.

As Josh In Chicago indicated upthread, the Deluxe Saint Cloud is great, and my gateway, and Plains was worth the few replays it took me to get it (now I get Plains lyrics/stance-wise better than some of Saint Cloud, despite her song-by-song explanations to Pitchfork, but that's just lyrics, the music was never a problem on either alb) Go MJ!

I got chills from that, she leans into the melody like it's nothing at all

Tour announced:

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lol CD version already sold out

holy shit, that song.

i wonder if Jake sings backing vocals on the whole album?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouKDEpytxlw

fantastic

Just one listen but this is very good -- not as immediate/hooky as Saint Cloud, but a more mature sound, more penetrating lyrics, and may well be a better album....time will tell. Lead singles were my favorite -- "Right Back to It" and "Bored" are stunners -- but the comedown in the last four tracks or so ("Crowbar," "The Wolves") also grabbed me.

I am such a sucker for a good male/female harmony and this record's got a bunch of them

Loving it so far but not ready to compare to St Cloud, which would be unfair. That album was a grower and I expect this one will be too. But first listen, every song is a winner.

Kind of annoyed that this is out today, but Anti says they aren't shipping the copy I pre-ordered three months ago until April 5th.

huh i had no idea this was on Anti and not Merge! Still need to listen to it

pgwp otm

more songs from the territory of st. cloud but i'm not complaining bc they're great

well of all the great records released yesterday this is the one i can't stop listening to