Off the back of 2023’s breakout LP ‘Rat Saw God’ and guitarist MJ Lenderman’s solo success with last year’s sublime ‘Manning Fireworks’, there are more eyes on Wednesday than ever before. But they wear that scrutiny with the easy chemistry of musicians who have spent countless hours jamming together and an equal number hanging out.
‘Bleeds’ offers a visceral reminder that frontwoman Karly Hartzman’s granular approach to songwriting goes much deeper, with each narrative flourish on the North Carolina indie-rock band’s new album complemented beautifully by a mix of blown-out distortion, weirdo-country slide guitar and serrated melodies that Hartzman has spent the best part of a decade figuring out. Often, it feels like getting hit with a knockout punch after a long setup.
As Hartzman digs deeper into life’s grimy margins – during ‘Bleeds’, bodies are pulled from rivers, houses burnt down, and teeth smashed out with baseball bats – steel guitarist Xandy Chelmis, drummer Alan Miller and bassist Ethan Baechtold hum along with the unshowy flair of the world’s sickest bar band. When Lenderman peels off instant-fix guitar leads on ‘Candy Breath’ and ‘Townies’, meanwhile, Wednesday’s ability to retool debilitating lows into explosive highs becomes something euphoric.
Recorded with long-time collaborator Alex Farrar in Wednesday’s home base of Asheville, ‘Bleeds’ is both more self-contained and ambitious than its predecessor. It’s as though Hartzman has challenged herself to hang the same number of ideas and flashes of gnarly imagery on something with a slighter frame.
The throat-shredding ‘Wasp’ is a bitter, spiteful blast of Bridge And Tunnel-esque post-hardcore, its hooks deliriously trampled underfoot by charging drums and guitar sludge, while the cracked-porcelain waltz ‘The Way Love Goes’ is emotionally gutting despite getting in and out in under two minutes. “I oversold myself on the night we met,” Hartzman sings, tracing breadcrumbs back to the start of her abandoned romantic relationship with Lenderman.
Elsewhere, Hartzman allows some bruises to blossom. “Cracked my tooth on a cough drop,” she half-murmurs to open ‘Pick Up That Knife’, her quiet delivery briefly muting the howling frustration behind the line. It takes some 40 seconds for that rage to win out, but it does. With a surge of apoplectic noise, Wednesday bite down hard, the payoff underlining the joined-up thinking behind the song’s structure and also the crushing power wielded by a special band. Rock records don’t come much better than this.
