Rusty Mountain

Love songs are like identical gingerbread cookies in a shop window: cute, sweet, but cloying after a minute. Here, instead of sugar, there are rusty nails piled up in a heap. You can build a mountain out of them, or you can just admire their uselessness. In any case, it's more honest than yet another “he” and “she” accompanied by a boring chorus.

Instead of romantic nostalgia, there is anger, sarcasm, and a healthy weariness of banalities. But anger works like sandpaper here: it scrapes away the surface and then reveals something real. And when, suddenly, in this prickly tirade, the confession “it's hard to love, but it's possible” appears, it doesn't sound saccharine, but like a reward for honesty.

In the end, it's not about love as an eternal fairy tale, but about love as hard work - with nails, with bitterness, but also with cigarettes in the sun. And that's definitely better than any radio song.

Producer: Neko Case

Writer: Neko Case and Paul Rigby

Additional production: Tucker Martin

Mixing: Tucker Martin and Neko Case

Recording: Jeff Galeger

Additional sound engineers: Tucker Martin, Darryl Neudorf, and John Hagler

Vocal arrangements and field recordings: Neko Case

Mastering: Heba Kadri

Neko Case: vocals, backing vocals, bells

Rachel Flotard: backing vocals

Paul Rigby: guitars

Sebastian Steinberg: bass

Adam Schatz: keyboards