Head Of Roses

On her second full-length record, Head of Roses, Jenn Wasner follows a winding thread of intuition into the unknown and into healing, led by gut feelings and the near-spiritual experience of visceral songwriting. The result is a combination of Wasners ability to embrace new levels of vulnerability, honesty and openness, with the self-assuredness that comes with a decade-plus career as a songwriter, producer, multi-instrumentalist and prolific collaborator. Simply put, Head of Roses is a record about heartbreak, but from a dualistic perspective. Its about the experience of having ones heart broken and breaking someone elses heart at the same time. But beyond that, its about having to reconcile the experience of ones own pain with the understanding that its impossible to go through life without being the source of great pain for someone else. Part of the journey for me has been learning to take responsibility for the parts of things that are mine, even when Im in a lot of pain through some behavior or action of someone else. If Im expecting to be forgiven for the things Ive done and the choices Ive made and the mistakes that Ive made, it would be incredibly cowardly and hypocritical to not also do the work thats required to forgive others the pain they caused me. Showcasing the depth of Wasners songwriting capabilities and the complexity of her vision, Head of Roses calls upon her singular ability to create a fully-formed sonic universe via genre-bending amalgamation of songs and her poetic and gut punch lyrics. Its the soundtrack of Wasner letting go of control, of heartbreak, and of hiding who she is: I think Ive finally reached a point in my career where I feel comfortable enough with myself and what I do, that Im able to relax into a certain simplicity or straight forwardness that I wasnt comfortable with before. Head of Roses puts Wasners seismically powerful voice front and center. Those vocals help thread it all together -- its a textured musicality, quilted together by intentionality and intuition. Wasner and producer Nick Sanborn (Sylvan Esso, Made of Oak) assembled Head of Roses in the same way youd put together a mixtape, painstakingly and carefully melding disparate parts into a whole, transcending genre to weave a story of heartache and healing together. And in the same way a homemade, painstakingly-crafted mixtape plays out, with the makers fingerprints left all over its songs so goes Head of Roses. Carefully curated and culled from the depths of Wasners heartbreak and healing, its deeply, intensely personal. But just as we change ourselves by embracing the pain of loss and uncertainty, so too are the purpose of these songs changed through the act of creating them. Having succeeded in healing the person who made them, they now exist for those who find them in their own moments of need. Always in motion, the original spirit of creation has already flown from this placebut its left behind a blueprint, a tool for you, to lean on, too.