Wish Me Well is the newest release from Coldhart, one of GOTHBOICLIQUE‘s most unique voices. Made in New York over 5 days thanks to plenty of mushrooms (according to Coldhart) and the fantastic production skills of YAWNS, Wish Me Well is a journey into the mind of Coldy as he attempts to escape his thoughts through any vice available. Whether drugged, drunk, or drowning in the murky waters of relationships, we’re right alongside as Coldhart walks us through where he’s been, and we’re just as confused as Coldy when he hypothesizes where he’s going. Come along.
“Black Chanel” creeps into your mind like an insecure thought in the middle of the night. The more you think about it, the more it builds. The thought echoes across your brain, bouncing off of every bad experience you can remember. But you’re used to it, this is your new normal. Coldhart croons out his own tale of misfortune, detailing his methods of dealing with these thoughts. The allusions to the Lost Boys illustrate Coldhart’s feelings of forced isolation, “All I want is solitude. I don’t wanna be with myself.” This is the ballad of a man barely coping with that fact as he travels down whatever tunnel he can burrow himself into, any solution that will give a momentary escape to a permanent problem.
The second song on the EP features guest production by fish narc, and the combination of YAWNS and fish creates something truly beautiful. The somber yet optimistic instrumental of “Get Dressed” sounds like it was plucked straight from the score of the best mid-2000’s high school movie. This is the perfect stage for Coldhart’s soothing drawl as he delivers a primal scream of heavily sedated emotional honesty. Coldhart may not know what he wants, but he knows he’s cycling (“Here we go again.”) Is he gonna end up happy this time? Here’s hoping.
The screeching synth and relaxed 808 provided by YAWNS really shines through on “Ashes”. The gentle strumming of a guitar accompanies Coldhart’s decent into his story of love-lost. The man is hurting. (“Even with broken legs, I still run right back to you.”) Feeling trapped in “the way he’s living now”, Coldhart clearly has been here and done this far too many times. Why does he put himself through this? You don’t get a sense of pessimism from his lyrics, and although he’s definitely throwing the blame around (who doesn’t from time to time), he always brings it back to himself. Coldhart seems like he’s got a great moral center; he’s just doing the best like all of us. You feel his hope for himself, and it’s contagious. (“Every lost bird still flies towards home”) Sometimes pain is part of the cycle; we can get solace from the fact that there needed to be something burning bright in order to make those ashes. It may be gone, but that fire can get reignited. The difficult part is finding a match.
The grungy bassline that greets us on “Thru the Screen” acts as our guide in this piece. As the drum track grows in scope, the guitar riffs come from all corners of the room. The chaos is spreading, and life starts to hit hard. (“I wanna feel your body thru my screen” “I wanna be forgotten in the thought of you, in a mausoleum that was meant for two”) Coldhart’s escape mechanisms aren’t working as well and he’s losing his grasp on what’s in front of him. As his desires grow, his self-worth continues to fade, and he just wants to bury himself in the presence of someone. (“Sending shivers all down my spine, electric feeling that I can’t deny”). He feels alive when he’s with someone, but what seems to be more important is that he’s feeling, period. The beat grows more complex as his desires grow more focused. The simplicity of wanting to be loved juxtaposed with the reality of actually loving someone creates such a discourse that the song changes entirely in order to avoid thinking about it anymore. But like we experienced in “Black Chanel”, those thoughts are inescapable. Slowly but surely the song regains it’s original form as Coldhart desperately tries to find another feeling, another thing to bury himself in.
“Morissey” comes on like that feeling of euphoria that reveals it’s beautiful head three hours into an intense acid trip. It’s dragging it’s feet because it isn’t in a hurry. Coldhart mumbles out his tale as the euphoria fades. The weight of the empty relationships he’s craved in the past truly hits him. (“Conversations, we don’t really say none.”) Leaving when you wake up, life-taker; the imagery these phrases conjure make one feel claustrophobic. What happened to the euphoria? It’s ruined by reality. Colorful metaphors aside (“I’m gonna hit her right like a highway curve”), what happens tomorrow when the euphoria fades, as it always does? What about the next day, or the next month? Coldhart disguises his hurt with frigidity, but this isn’t even close to what he wanted to do and he admits it. He didn’t want to be here, he wants to get out and experience life (“I gotta go, I got more to see.”) At the end of the song, we’re walked out the same way we came in, but something’s off, something’s changed. As the instrumental fades and Coldhart is left shouting into the abyss, the answer becomes clear.
With some spice added onto the bland chicken cutlet that is the 1959 smash-hit “Earth Angel“, YAWNS creates a beautiful reimagining with bass so heavy it could crack the foundation. Coupled with Coldhart’s angelic background vocals, “Devil baby” delivers a product so smooth that it could cure eczema if the science community would get off it’s lazy ass and return my calls. While that may not make complete sense, neither does this bold track. It really shouldn’t work, but in my opinion it’s the strongest way Coldy and YAWNS could have closed this EP. “I’m just a fool, a fool in love with you” perfectly encapsulates what this EP is all about. Not to mention the feeling of the track, making something great out of something that doesn’t deserve it, seems to symbolize Coldhart’s aspirations towards his love-life. While Coldhart seems to struggle with self-worth issues (like so many of us), he knows what he wants and he definitely knows how to get it. I hope the end result is as great as this EP.
In closing, this album is an impressive combination of Coldhart’s skillfully-delivered feelings of isolation and the driving, soulful, understated sounds that could only come from the mind of YAWNS. The feelings of honesty evoked in this EP really speak volumes about the artists. Be it their reoccurring flaws, their beautiful souls, or their pursuit of something real, everyone can relate to the masterful lessons that these performers deliver through their accounts of emotional turmoil. I wish everyone reading this the absolute best, go get what you deserve.