Sunday afternoon,
I am melancholy but not sad.
my company has been closed for three months, i know it will be hard to start again.
something positive, however, in this bad period there is.
My family and the music from my huge vinyl collection.
I discovered in this period a fabulous record that perfectly represents my state of mind
For me, "wind city airoport" is already a record of the year
Favorite track: Those Wedding Bells.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Purchasable with gift card
$7USD or more
Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
4 panel wallet with a high gloss finish featuring photography by Cheer Zhao & Mike Walker. Layout and design by Mike Walker. Released by TaiDuo Music in 2020.
Includes unlimited streaming of Wind City Airport
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
seeing my love wield such a heavy club
and i'm alive again, high again
i'm counting the minutes til we all are finished
with our lives again, by my friend
i'm high again
high again..
seeing my dreams working heavy machines
and it's not right again to be high again
i'm taking my cues from places i've been to
and its alright again, hi again
i'm high again
high again..
back home in the West
i had tried my best
keeping it together a little better than before
we moved on from there
with a sudden stare
i barely even remember the pain
and even if those dreams were real
they'd drift away in a minute
and even if my life was forfeit
i'd forget
sitting by the lake
this must be the place
remember when you wrapped your arms and legs around my waist?
you cried through your sweater
but now you're doing better
you barely even remember my name
and even if those dreams were real
they'd drift away in a minute
and even if it all was for not
you forgot
well i was walking by the turbines
by the time i made the sunrise
it was setting in another part of town
and then i missed out
it aint easy teasing me with the question
of how we all got here..
and all my dreams were disconnected
every frame completely separate
when i try to tell you now i know it makes no sense
no it aint easy seizing these little chances
when everything seems clear
January, hello again
you seem just like my distant friends
i saw you last year
one time so cold
another sign i'm getting old
and all my friends were sitting talking
all their phones were all turned off
all telling stories 'bout the old days
when our eyes were beaming gold rays
it aint easy pleasing me with the idea
that we're now spread so thin
but then i woke up in a train yard
with the windows glowing yellow
on the cold wet dirty pavement
my knees and hands were shaking
cause it aint easy being these other people
that we see out on the street
January right behind me
it seems just like my past lives dreams
i see them still, on silver screens
the greatest films i've ever seen
dream on your own time
thats fine
nothing's wrong
somethings right under the surface
walking out on the night
just like i'm lurking
feel the love, feel the light
i guess it's working
tell me whats on your mind
if you've been hurting
tell me whats going on
what you been thinking?
do you feel
that your heart is slowly sinking?
cast a line out to sea
then sink those hooks in
you were smiling at me
i caught you looking
at my reflection
just a bit of introspection
for that classic passive passenger in me
doing laps 'round the moon
to pass the night by
everyone that you love
gone waving bye-bye
things you cannot control
man it's not worth it
letting them spill your blood
there's just no purpose
for this to linger
just a second more
between us there's an obstacle impossible for me
all on board
(we got a story going somewhere..)
we don't give a damn
(cause thats's just how we do it here)
what would you say?
yeah, what would i say?
glance to the left
and then to the right
before you make up your mind
would it really be so bad?
would it really be so bad?
i've got a pocket of gold
and more where it came from
but nobody to share it with
i've got a pocket of gold
but nobody's around
or down
ohh..
the darkest mind
the greyest sky i've ever seen
no sun today
not much to say about anything
the gravel scrapes
the raindrops taste like memories
my bones they creak
the floorboards squeak out melodies
this golden age of dreaming is almost done
and i've known it all along
it was on the wall..
the sound of wind
meandering through cracks in glass
the windows cry
for someone's eyes to cast a glance
this golden age of dreaming is almost done
and i've known it all along
those secret songs
they'll all be forgot
they'll all be forgot
but since i talked to you
you showed me theres another view
and i realize its not my time
i hide a knife behind these eyes..
it's alright if you can't take time
time moves steady, it'll be there tomorrow
time is a shapeshifter in my mind
i've taken more than I should borrow right now
running my fingers through your long black hair
time is a ghost in moments when you are around
but i know it'll come right back
ignoring it is the only way to kill it
but then
it rears its head
it was only hiding
it isn't dead
its never dying
washed up to shore like the long lost tide
the wind carries me like a babe to your doorstep
thank the great sprit in the sky that i
didn't take time to ask where i was going
and then
you show your face
you were only hiding
i missed this taste
you were so inviting
you need some space
to find some light
inside a place
where time is dying
little words spoken quietly
never stand test of time
little things you do silently
resting easy on my mind..
little boy, you think you're a man
well, have you carried the weight?
of the one who loves you everyday
through the darkness and the rain
she believed that you..
said you always stay
if you never meant it
then why did you say?
little boy, learn from your father now
bring home bread, learn from mistakes
little child, look at your mother now
see the light gone from her face
she believed that you..
said you always stay
if you never meant it
then why did you say?
credits
released January 29, 2020
"Nature’s Neighbor has a knack for evoking emotion. The musical project of Chicago multi-instrumentalist Mike Walker, does not shy away from much; both lyrically and musically. Nature’s Neighbor is more than just someone making music, it’s a friend— offering a lend shoulder to cry on and an ear to listen."
- Phluff
"Wind City Airport is one of the most straightforward and uninhibited releases of [Walker's] career, employing shuffling Americana and plaintive arrangements of guitar and piano to evoke the driftless feeling of being trapped at the airport."
- The Alternative
"Thoughtful indie rock buoyed by luxe arrangements that never feel too slick or too overwhelming. Elegantly produced and intimate as always."
- Bandcamp
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All songs written & performed by Nature's Neighbor
** Except for 'Fullerton' which was written by Daniel Lee **
Seth Engel - bass, drums, bongos, guitar, auxiliary percussion
Daniel Lee - guitar, vibraphone, vocals, lyrics
Beau Reddington - lyrics
Alex Moore - handclaps
Russell Harrison - violin
Perry Cowdery - guitar
Terrill mast - piano
** Bass part for 'Fullerton' originally written by Mike Nardone **
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Recorded & mixed @ Pallet Sound by Seth Engel
Album artwork by Cheer Zhao & Mike Walker
Mastered by Michael Mac @ Pallet Sound
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Wind City Airport, more than any other album in my discography, is a work that signals the end of an era. Not only was it the last album that I made during the 2010s, a decade that saw the birth of Nature’s Neighbor, but it was also the last album to be made while Cheer and I were traveling back and forth between China and the US. It was the last album made while Cheer was working as a flight attendant for American Airlines. And it was the last album made in a pre COVID-19 world, before the pandemic would alter the course of so many of our lives.
And although I could not have known that so many things were about to drastically change come 2020, I did feel a sense of things coming to an end. And that feeling of things ending is all over this album. You can see it in the album cover, a photo taken by Cheer where I’m on our balcony watching the sun go down over Chicago’s Lower West Side. You can see it in song titles like “Counting the Minutes” and “January Again.” And you can hear it in the lyrics I wrote and the way that I sang them. There is a deep melancholy to this entire album. It’s something that, at the time of making it, I didn’t fully understand. But now, looking back a few years later, I can see a version of me that somehow intuitively knew that with the dawn of 2020, things would never be the same.
And that is a sad feeling. I loved the 2010s, for the most part anyway. I feel like the first half of the 2010s was filled with this great optimism. Maybe that was just me being in my early 20s, I’m not sure. But I’m sure that most American’s can agree with me that the second half of the 2010s felt a great deal darker and heavier than say 2010-2014/2015. And it’s not just Americans that can feel this. I’d go so far as to say that it was a global thing.
And that brings me to China. I had no idea that 2019 would be the last year that Cheer and I would visit her family in Nanchang together. When Cheer and I left in January of 2019, I figured that we’d be back in six months or something like that. But sadly, with the coming of COVID-19 and the deterioration of our marriage, that was not to be. Knowing what I know now, I look back on that final trip to Nanchang with a lot of fondness as well as a good deal of sadness. I loved visiting China with Cheer. It was one of the most enlightening and life changing experiences of my entire life. From 2015 until that last trip in 2019, Cheer and I visited China about seven times, usually around the Chinese New Year. We’d usually stay for a month or two but some stays were even longer. My longest stay in China was three months. And during 2018 and 2019, due to Cheer being employed by American Airlines, we were able to fly to China in business class for under $100 USD. I have so many good memories of exploring Nanchang, Jingdezhen, Beijing and so many other parts of China with Cheer. Her family was always so kind to me, and I will cherish the memories we made for the rest of my life.
But as things were getting darker in America, ominous clouds were also gathering over China, and I could feel that as well. When I first visited China in early 2014, things felt very open and free. It felt like anything was possible and I was excited by the rapid growth I could see everywhere. It felt as though China was kfinallyopening up to the rest of the world. But as the 2010s came to a close, I could feel the government cracking down and the atmosphere start to take a dark turn. Although my last visit in 2019 was full of heartwarming family moments, when I would walk the streets alone, I started to feel that maybe China was not as good of a place for foreigners as I had once thought. All the same, we tried our best to enjoy every moment. One day, during our stay at her parent’s home, I wrote the opening track ‘Counting the Minutes’ on their upright piano. It felt like the start to a new project.
Upon returning to the US, getting sick, and then recovering, I felt very inspired to start a new album with Seth in Pallet Sounds, the same Bridgeport studio where we recorded all of Ur. So I started demoing out songs and booking all day studio sessions at Pallet. I had fallen in love with the studio while making the last album and thought it would be a good idea to make one more record there with Seth with essentially the same equipment. But I also knew that if we were to record another album in the same style as Ur, I would probably lose my mind. So I just went back to writing simpler songs on guitar and piano. It felt like a more honest and grounded way of songwriting.
Although I wasn’t as keen to collaborate with tons of other musicians like I was on the Ur sessions, I was delighted to have Daniel Lee come into the studio to track a song that we had demoed out five years prior called “Fullerton.” The song was mostly written by Dan and he named it after the street that we lived on when we were roommates back in 2011. Mike Nardone, our other 2011 roommate, showed up at the Owlrey to play bass on the demo back in 2014. That recording session would mark the last time the three of us would play music in the same room together. I always loved the song and when I was making track listings for the new album I thought it would fit in snugly with the other songs Seth and I were recording. Dan came down to Pallet and we knocked out the whole song in one session.
All of the songs on this album have a world weariness to them that give the album a very melancholic feel. Looking back now, it is very clear that I was in a bit of a depressed state when I wrote these songs. Songs like “January Again” express my feelings on the sadness that comes with the end of your 20s and feeling that youthful exuberance slowly drain out of you only to be replaced by numbness and regret. There’s a fondness and longing for the simpler times that came from experiencing my tight knit group of college friends becoming fragmented, more and more overcome with adult responsibilities, moving away and slowly falling out of touch. I think most people approaching their 30s who had a close group of friends in high school and or college can relate to a lot of the sentiments expressed in songs like “By the Lake” and “January Again.”
There is a lot of loneliness that is expressed on this album as well. I spent many nights walking down empty streets at night smoking joints and thinking “What the Hell happened?” Even when you’re in a relationship or surrounded by massive groups of people, you are not immune to feelings of intense loneliness. I especially felt that way during my time spent in airports when traveling back and forth from China and The US. I know it is a privilege to travel by air, especially across the world. But there is undeniably a unique existential dread that comes with being stranded at an airline terminal with your connecting flight nowhere in sight. I wish I could do more to better explain the complicated set of emotions that served as inspiration for the creation of this album, but for now, this will have to do. This album is for anyone who is stuck in an airport or airplane with a good pair of headphones and a lot of time to kill. We may be delayed for now, but I know that someday soon, we will all reach our destination. Fly safe.
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'Wind City Airport' is dedicated to Kay Benson (1939 - 2019)
Four indie-pop reflections on growth and loss from the Australian singer-songwriter, sustained by robust pianos and fervent vocals. Bandcamp New & Notable Feb 29, 2024