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Dark Whimsy And Soft Surrealism

by Broken Hearts Are Blue

supported by
John Isaacson
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John Isaacson This band can do wrong since 1999's (?) The Truth About Love, which will always hold a special place in my heart. This new record both eschews and builds on the aesthetics of that now classic record with bombastic drum fills and the unique brassy timbre of the singer's voice. Favorite track: After the World, the World Remains.
brantly
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brantly A tremendous LP from maybe THE most underrated emo band of all time. From the ashes of the cathartic Ordination of Aaron came BHAB, which was different beast. Minor key laments, beautiful lacings of pinging guitar knock & ting with introspective lyrical haunts marked the first LP. This 2nd LP is a progression, keeping with the spirit of '98, this adds more melancholy brit pop, forlorn indie rock, crooked jangle pop, plaintive bar-lit torch songs & really ace musicianship. Highly recommended.
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  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    2xLP In a gatefold cover with printed lyric sleeves, pressed on translucent tapestry pink/tussock gold vinyl, and limited to 500 copies. OUT NOW!

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1.
I have echoes in my skin Of Flaubert and Berryman Whispering their pleasantries Of ghostly counsel and dark whimsy Where life’s what ifs stay with me This is a sentimental education between you and me It’s not going to open any doors to a soul Where there is just a hole I have echoes under my skin From the cruel din of Where or When To the folly of original sin Where life’s what ifs stay with me This is a sentimental education between you and me It’s not going to open any doors to my soul Where there is just a hole I have echoes under my skin Sleepless nights from what could’ve been A life by number, isn’t living I have echoes in my skin Humming Jim’s Letters to Yesenin Chanting the void’s circadian jokes If joy ever comes let it feel like hope
2.
Born at mid-day, the last of my kin A fragile son, already a has-been Never a life so routine as mine Perhaps I am the last of my kind Slapped by the wind’s desolate touch I was and wasn’t moved all that much ‘96 was the last year on earth The archivist’s clever rebirth I reset the world back to one Set out West with cheek in tongue Always a stranger always set apart I held the cosmos in my beating heart I would not play to the gallery scene So I wrote my story on the postcard sea If and when I find all that was lost I’ll put ‘once upon a time’ back in her box For life is but a moment preset to end With my feet up and back upon a bed All the papers and secrets left behind to rot Will leave the rest of you to figure out what you got We’re all left alone on our final slab Until then, I’m gonna put my tap shoes on like ol’ Ahab Everyday is a whale hunt with stone in hand
3.
I wrote you this note for real Hi, do you like me? Yes or No A strangely baroque reveal Writing your name in brand-new snow The kids at the mall are ghouls Haunting a place I used to know But I was never that cool When Jennifer laughed, I laughed, she laughed The closer you get to me (Don't think, don't ask, drive faster) The more that you do not see I'm underground Tell me, is life worth living underground? Tell me is life worth living? The closer you get to me, I'm sorry There's something about this age Too much history and pointless rage You think you have so much time Over the years you bury those close I wonder where they are now In dreams they feel so alive I wish I could see you somehow The phone in my hand collapse, collapse The closer you get to me (Don't think, don't ask, drive faster) The more that you do not see I'm underground Tell me, is life worth living underground? Tell me is life worth living The closer you get to me, I'm sorry
4.
There is a painting on my wall Inside it I tried to say it all To you I loved and never told Yours is a hand I’ll never hold I sang to you under the moon Doubtless too much and too soon After tonight the world remains After the world has emptied its veins There is a clock upon the wall Time stands still when you call I wrote a letter I hope you’ll read The gist was “do not forget me”
5.
Casual Acts 04:08
Baby, these are the facts We’re barely making it I’m so sick of all the pricks And their righteous kicks Gotta fake it, to make it In this slack jaw world Now we get our fill from a pill Or get our color wheel aligned But not yours, not mine, our facts are casual acts Baby, these are the facts We’re stuck with the hacks I’m so ill from all the sleaze So kid no thank you please Gotta fake it, to make it From a vulgar hand Now we get our life from a shot Or get our color wheel aligned But not yours, not mine, our facts are casual acts Are we at the end of the dock? Have we stepped upon the precipice? The headline every morning reads: Death, Taxes and Melancholy “What cannot be cured must be endured” Is that all there is? A first line, a last line? Something in between? Now we get our fill from a pill Or get our color wheel aligned But not yours, not mine, our facts are casual acts
6.
Rapt by the cagey moon that night You and I took in the wistful light On the hill where East Hall stood I brushed along your womanhood We riffed on Proust and Frankie O. Bananafish and Vertigo Clammy hands and open nerves You drew me close to your curves We looked down upon Walwood I wondered if you understood You adored My Life as a Dog Wong Kar-Wai and The Dekalog Once upon a time in ol’ Kalamazoo I stood alone in my room with a view I drank a lot and sang a Vine song or two Now there’s nothing left of me and you Do you ever think back, do you ever recall Oh, oh, those moments lost to time at East Hall Na na na na… You leaned into me in your sober way And said, “hold me forever and a day” All I brought to my trite reply Was wild mirth in ample supply There’s something about this place The fixed and gentle pace There’s something about this place Its provincial nice on the face Its sins are bared in subtle ways Its rainbow lies made out of grays
7.
Welcome to my first love song, and it’s all for you You make my life so much better, oh girl you do You’re a kid of the seventies, wistfully I am too You bare a class of darkness, the same that I do C’mon and be my better half, one side of our photograph You’re the one I want I wrote a haiku and put the Book of Job inside it for you ‘I want to know love’ you say, before the two of us slip away I want to take your broken heart away from you And stick a Hal Blaine beat inside of all that blue The joke is in the writing that I’ll die in soft lighting
8.
Film Studies 03:38
It was just a dream in the hallways of my head Firework in hand, a clock above the bed Left behind on the cutting room floor Two black birds drift above the shore Every door shut, every scene the last Once the credits roll, the die is cast Two dancers kiss when December dies Difficult lovers swim between thighs In this world if I could find the word A perfect tune like that of a bird The feeling behind it would be gone Leaving instead the loss in a song
9.
What’s the first question I asked Of her when we blindly met “What rhymes with death?” Her green eyes took my breath She took my hand in her hand At first blush, mouth in sand She said, “you had me at death” I’ve never been so out of my depth You adore Solange, I fancy Truffaut I’m keen on The Last Picture Show You dig Afro Punk and Charlie Brown Lorna Simpson (Billy Childish) and Boogie Down Those foxy eyes of gleaming jade Be my baby, Be My Little Baby gotta be our soundtrack “Once you go black” you never come back You opened the door and I walked through to get to you We are so lonesome in our own ways, I know it’s true You opened the door and I walked through to get to you
10.
I showed up to your place With hope nearly erased The least ribald man To stage a last stand Not even sure I know what to ask for You put your foot down between the door You said, “I’m shaving an elephant” Hardly a code, I knew what you meant “A penny for your thoughts my dear” The door shut quick making it oh so clear I put my weary grin back in my pocket Before you judge, give it a try, don’t knock it The wires in my skin are touch and go Every dazed feeling so beat and hollow Under a cloud and lost at sea The shamans finally dug the mamby pamby out of me When love cuts rough and you’ve had enough, enough is enough I am sorry, oh so sorry for Choosing the self-help, becoming a bore These are the hang-ups that lead me to think I am The wrong man for you If so baby, what can I do? The ease of my new delight that you’ll never hear Is the thorny side of another year But when I checked all the math Which bared all the facts I knew I was the least difficult man for you
11.
Down in the mouth of never In the valley where he would crawl He could see some sky, but not it all Gone to the dogs of soldier want Of wild nights when they call His baritone in the hour so small He said what we felt, he said it all He wrote letters to a million nobodies To the bruised and ill at ease Down in the hole of forever In the room with all of the snow A poet’s pen now and then gets lost And tangled in the arms of the reeds Homesick wordsmith needs help I wish for the calm that he couldn’t find All that never will be, will still be For the living
12.
It’s always there in the never light Of the ever dark, its time And its dance toward end It’s over I wander in air of whispers The last of us Through futures of illusions Riding onto the waves Out of silence Maybe a word Maybe the first Or maybe the last It’s over I’ve been chasing someone (something) that I don’t understand It’s over

about

Council Records No. 30 (CR-30)

This 16-song double LP contains 12 new tracks recorded over the past year, with 4 additional tracks selected from the Goodbye Bunny Smith and Here Is Always Nowhere digital EPs. Packaged in a brilliantly designed gatefold cover with printed lyric sleeves, pressed on translucent tapestry pink/tussock gold vinyl, and limited to 500 copies.

credits

released March 4, 2022

Produced and Mixed by Knol Tate
Recorded March - June 2021
Basic guitar and drum tracks recorded by Jack Shirley at the Atomic Garden in Oakland, CA
Guitar overdubs recorded by Paul Korte at Santo Recording in Oakland, CA
Bass, keys, percussion, and vocals recorded by Knol Tate in Minneapolis, MN
Film Studies drums recorded by Matt Lynch at Mysterious Mammal in Inglewood, CA
Mastered by Justin Perkins at Mystery Room Mastering

Cover Design by Ryan Gage
Photograph by Colleen Woolpert

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Broken Hearts Are Blue Detroit, Michigan

Broken Hearts Are Blue are a indie rock band whose members live in Kalamazoo, Minneapolis, Alameda, and Los Angeles.

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