The duo’s Jack Barnett produced Crooked Wing with Graham Sutton, while George Barnett executive produced the record. “This album is both more surreal & somehow more direct than anything we’ve ever done,” George reflected in a press release. “A crooked wing is an ear, you have one on each side of your body, and they have a rippled shape. Maybe if you’re lucky they can help you fly.”
“‘Industrial Love Song’ is a duet between two cranes on a building site,” Jack Barnett explained. “Caroline sings the part of one crane, I sing the other; they can’t touch (their movements are controlled by the operator), but when the sun rises they hope that their shadows will cross. I like how the title George came up with misdirects expectations — it’s not that kind of industrial.”
“It’s hard to attach a time period to this song,”George Barnett added. “It’s progressive music made with instruments that have been around for hundreds of years.”
“As we exit the mechanical age, you realize how much we have in common with our machines, how human they are,” Jack continued. “Suddenly it didn’t feel so absurd to write a love song from their perspective.”
Commenting on ‘Bells’, Jack shared: “This song started with a field recording we made of a bell in a small Orthodox Greek church. You can hear it in the song, and the rest of the song grew out of it. That one bell strike set a lot of the album in motion.”
Crooked Wing Cover Artwork:
Crooked Wing Tracklist:
1. Waiting
2. Bells
3. A Season in Hell
4. Industrial Love Song [ft. Caroline Polachek]
5. I’m Already Here
6. Wild Fields (I Don’t Want To)
7. The Old World
8. Crooked Wing
9. Goodnight
10. Return