#p.s. eliot

[mywifeleftme]

128: Swearin' // Swearin'

Swearin' Swearin' 2012, Salinas (Bandcamp)

I never saw Swearin’ at a house show (though the bar I did see them at held maybe 30 people), but in the same way the smell of Sambuca makes my saliva queasily thicken, the second the needle drops on their s/t I get notes of Pabst, cigarette-couch/carpet, hot scalp, the wine of an overworked fan, giggling, keys jingling on carabiners, floor-lamp lighting, amp sizzle. (Pinning this idea for a band name here: Dirty Madeleine.)

Inane tag cloud ideas: loft apartment indie; park drinking punk; bike messenger affirmations; co-opcore; foragestyle; couch surf rock.

Me, as a YouTube commenter in nine years: I made out for the second time with the first girl I ever moved in with at a Swearin’ show! We don’t talk anymore, but I hope she is well.

Anyway, Swearin’ was always my fav of the Crutchfield twins’ many projects, emerging from the breakup of Birmingham, Alabama’s fondly remembered P.S. Eliot when Allison decided to pursue her own voice as a songwriter and move to NYC. She ended up dating and forming a band with Kyle Gilbride of Big Soda, and that band was Swearin’, so now you’re caught up.

The Crutchfield Twins’ Many Projects

Pre-2007: The Ackleys (Allison + Katie) 2007-2011: P.S. Eliot (Allison + Katie) 2011-present: Waxahatchee (Katie) 2012-2015, 2017-present?: Swearin’ (Allison) 2014-2017?: Allison Crutchfield solo 2022: Plains (Katie)

Robert Christgau said of P.S. Eliot, “Always there is the sound of becoming that the young treasure for one reason and the ex-young value for quite another,” and I think he’s on to what makes both Katie and Allison’s ‘00s and early ‘10s music so appealing—though the diaristic lyrics are angsty, sometimes irritable, or glum, there’s a comforting sense that they’re cool young people who are going to be Alright in the end. Even though the people in these songs may not have the details figured out, they know what the life they want feels like—and that translates into the aesthetics of the music. For Swearin’, it’s a form of comfortably broken-in indie rock with its influences (Breeders, the Merge Records catalogue, ‘90s pop punk, Julianna Hatfield etc.) so thoroughly subsumed that it sounds whole. Gilbride’s a big vocal presence here as well, his adenoidal whine a welcome contrast to Allison’s unfussed ‘90s alternative vibe. He takes lead on one of the self-titled’s real winners, the irresistible problem-party-guest narrative “Crashin’,” complete with a riff and solo that’d get a goofy thumbs up from the boys in Superchunk.

An album that is top-to-bottom charming like this one only needs a single stone classic to stay in the rotation for the long haul, and Swearin’ has one in “Just.” It’s an all-time romantic song in my personal canon, headlong as a crazy kiss in an alley, popping ‘60s girl group poses in the verses, with a chorus as elemental as they come. Crutchfield’s lyrics don’t miss either, mingling hesitation (“Closed off from love / I didn’t need the pain”) and dizzy desire (“I knew you had me the night we met / my empty room dripping wet / make believe we’re in my bed”).

Other Choice Words:

“Tennessee River, a drunken relapse / And her new girlfriend, she’s got a new girlfriend now.” (“Movie Star”) “Kings of the Airwaves / deprive and depraved / Fruit from the market / Demo tape cassette” (“Hundreds & Thousands”) “An artist’s mind / is stimulated by the aesthetic / I don’t know about art / but I think your music’s shit.” (“Fat Chance”)

Swearin’ cut a second very good record before calling it quits when Gilbride and Crutchfield broke things off, but they had a fine comeback with 2018’s Fall into the Sun, and I surely wouldn’t mind more from them. Consider this a call for like, Steve Malkmus to dial them up next time Pavement needs an opening act. Let’s do this.

128/365

[sharpened--edges]

P.S. Eliot, "We'd Never Agree" (2009)

[azpartygirlz]

Monday, September 27th

WAXAHATCHEE

with Katy Kirby at Club Congress (buy tix)

What do we hold on to from our past? What must we let go of to truly move forward?

Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield, a lyricist who has always let her listeners know exactly where she is at a given moment, spent much of 2018 reckoning with these questions and revisiting her roots to look for answers. The result is Saint Cloud, an intimate journey through the places she’s been, filled with the people she’s loved.

Written immediately in the period following her decision to get sober, the album is an unflinching self-examination. From a moment of reckoning in Barcelona to a tourist trap in Tennessee to a painful confrontation on Arkadelphia Road, from a nostalgic jaunt down 7th Street in New York City to the Mississippi Gulf, Crutchfield creates a sense of place for her soul-baring tales, a longtime staple of her storytelling.

This raw, exposed narrative terrain is aided by a shift in sonic arrangements as well. While her last two records featured the kind of big guitars, well-honed noise, and battering sounds that characterized her Philadelphia scene and strongly influenced a burgeoning new class of singer-songwriters, Saint Cloud strips back those layers to create space for Crutchfield’s voice and lyrics. The result is a classic Americana sound with modern touches befitting an artist who has emerged as one of the signature storytellers of her time.

From the origins of her band name—the beloved creek behind her childhood home—to scene-setting classics like “Noccalula” and “Sparks Fly,” listening to Waxahatchee has always felt like being invited along on a journey with a steely-eyed navigator. On Saint Cloud, Crutchfield adds a new sense of perspective to her travels. Reflecting on this, she says, “I think all of my records are turbulent and emotional, but this one feels like it has a little dose of enlightenment. It feels a little more calm and less reckless.”

Many of the narratives on Saint Cloud concern addiction and the havoc it wreaks on ourselves and our loved ones, as Crutchfield comes to a deeper understanding of love not only for those around her but for herself. This coalesces most clearly on “Fire,” which she says was literally written in transit, during a drive over the Mississippi River into West Memphis, and serves as a love song to herself, a paean to moving past shame into a place of unconditional self-acceptance. Coming from a songwriter long accustomed to looking in other directions for love, it’s a stirring moment when Crutchfield sings, “I take it for granted/If I could love you unconditionally/I could iron out the edges of the darkest sky.”

Which is not to say that Saint Cloud lacks Crutchfield’s signature poetry on matters of romantic love. Still, her personal evolution in this area is evident too, as this time around, Crutchfield examines what it really means to be with someone and how it feels to see our own patterns more clearly. On “Hell,” she sings: “I hover above like a deity/But you don’t worship me, you don’t worship me/You strip the illusion, you did it well/I’ll put you through hell.”

Crutchfield also looks at what it’s like to be romantically involved with another artist, someone in search of their own truth, on “The Eye”: “Our feet don’t ever touch the ground/Run ourselves ragged town to town/Chasing uncertainty around, a siren sound” and “We leave love behind without a tear or a long goodbye/as we wait for lightning to strike/We are enthralled by the calling of the eye.”

And of course, even when Crutchfield is taking a more nuanced approach to love, her ease with all-encompassing sentiments is still clear, with lines like “I give it to you all on a dime/I love you till the day I die” which sound culled from a classic torch song.

Over the course of Saint Cloud’s 11 songs, which were recorded in the summer of 2019 at Sonic Ranch in Tornillo, TX, and Long Pond in Stuyvesant, NY, and produced by Brad Cook (Bon Iver, Big Red Machine), Crutchfield peels back the distortion of electric guitars to create a wider sonic palette than on any previous Waxahatchee album. It is a record filled with nods to classic country (like the honky tonk ease of “Can’t Do Much”), folk-inspired tones (heard in the confessional lilt of “St. Cloud”), and distinctly modern touches (like the pulsating minimalism of “Fire”).

To bolster her vision, Crutchfield enlisted Bobby Colombo and Bill Lennox, both of the Detroit-based band Bonny Doon, to serve as her backing band on the record, along with Josh Kaufman (Hiss Golden Messenger, Bonny Light Horseman) on guitar and keyboards and Nick Kinsey (Kevin Morby, Elvis Perkins) on drums and percussion. Bonny Doon will also perform as Crutchfield’s live band during her extensive tours planned for 2020, which include the US and Europe.

Saint Cloud marks the beginning of a journey for Crutchfield, one that sees her leaving behind past vices and the comfortable environs of her Philadelphia scene to head south in search of something new. If on her previous work Crutchfield was out in the storm, she’s now firmly in the eye of it, taking stock of her past with a clear perspective and gathering the strength to carry onward.

[feastofbeast]

Swearin’: Grow into a Ghost

In 2011 P.S. Eliot twin Crutchfield sisters split up and formed their own separate bands, Katie as Waxahatchee and Allison as Swearin’.  One of them has blown up, while Swearin’ has remained more on the fringe, but I’ve just been chasing either for more music like their original P.S. Eliot project.  

This new track is the closest new thing from either band to sound like P.S. Eliot, and Allison’s vocals have tightened up exceptionally.  P.S. Eliot burned out bright too early and it only makes sense to further explore that style of music.  I only hope the rest of the album continues this trend, and I’ll have a new favorite for the fall.

Swearin’ - Fall into the Sun LP is available from Merge Records now on Ltd coke bottle clear vinyl, and was released earlier this month on October 5th.  

P.S. Interesting to see these guys join the same label that released the last Waxahatchee Great Thunder EP...wonder if they’ll be collaborating in the future      

[mergerecords]

Waxahatchee's new EP, Great Thunder, is available everywhere now on LP, CD and digital. Pick up a copy at your local record store or preferred digital outlet. http://smarturl.it/GreatThunder

"she has demonstrated just how few colors she needs to paint vividly." —Pitchfork

The Peak Vinyl edition, pressed on opaque yellow vinyl, is only available from the Merge Store and independent record stores.

[sharpened--edges]

P.S. Eliot, “Asphalt” (2011)

[nightowlin]

i’ve been heartbroken and i figured out we all make a choice -p.s. eliot, incoherent love songs

[somewherebeyondthecloset]

Aimlessly alive 🌵

[lechugafl]

Waxahatchee’s “Silver”

For fans of Speedy Ortiz, Hop Along, Mitski, Ex Hex, TORRES, Angel Olsen, Parquet Courts, The Men, Mikal Cronin, Cloud Nothings.

Katie Crutchfield, aka Waxahatchee, is a singer-songwriter who has been making her name as a solo artist for the past handful of years. Her last name might sound familiar because it is shared with her twin sister Allison (featured on lechuga mix 2017/03). Prior to both going solo, the sisters were together in a pop punk band called P.S. Elliot. Since those days, Waxahatchee has developed a more mature and developed indie rock sound. In “Silver”, she does a lot of self reflection about what it takes to move her in a world like the one we live in where she’d rather just stay motionless like an inanimate object or a stone statue of herself. Her newest album “Out In The Storm” just recently came out.

sharing is caring.

track featured on lechuga mix 2017/08.

available for free to listen and share on Apple Music and Spotify here: http://bit.ly/lechugamix201708

[stayathomenotdad]

Peach by P.S. Eliot!

[allracket]

Waxahatchee is a project created by singer- songwriter, Katie Crutchfield. She just released her fourth full-length album, Out in the Storm. This album, full of heartbreak and recovery, reigns true to her beautifully crafted and personal lyrics. Her sound on this album is a little more hi-fi than her previous work (excluding the demos on the deluxe edition). She begins to sound like a love child of Alanis Morrissette and The Dixie Chicks. While the lyrics are spot on, and some of the sounds are interesting, it does feel as if something is missing. Some of the tracks lack the dynamic edge or intimate aura that really set a song apart. I am really intrigued on quite a few tracks, but there are a few generic folk-rock tunes that really lose me. While I do have my gripes with this album, I’m overall impressed. Crutchfield never fails to provide us with some interesting perspectives with her poetic writing, and this album does not stray from that. I really recommend giving this album a chance, and a listen.

FAVE TRACKS: Recite Remorse, Never Been Wrong, A Little More, Sparks Fly

LEAST FAVE TRACK: No Question

6.5/10

LISTEN HERE

[drunkenwerewolfdotcom]

Waxahatchee makes her voice heard on Out in the Storm

Read the article in full on DrunkenWerewolf:

There’s a pivotal scene that closes out the first season of Spaced, the cult TV debut of Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, and director Edgar Wright, in which Tim has an epiphany waiting for his ex-girlfriend to arrive at the bar. “It’s like walking in on yourself, you know? Like, ‘What are you...

Full article here.

[kxlly]

P.S. Eliot - Diana