Skeleton Sessions is out now.
This isnt a collection of brand-new songs. It is us returning to stories we already released.
Stripping away some of the production so we could hear the words underneath it again.
Kenneth wrote alot of the finished lyrics for The Quiet Damage, but the songs didnt begin with him sitting alone and making everything up.
We both wrote our stories down.
Kenneth and I live in different countries, but we met whenever we could. Sometimes it was about music, but alot of the time one of us just needed the other person.
We have similar experiences with addiction. Our lives arent exactly the same, but we both understand what it feels like to lose control, try to quit, mess up and carry the guilt from things that happened while using.
Sometimes you need to talk to somebody who doesnt require the cleaned-up version of your story.
We would meet and write pieces of what was happening. Other conversations happened through Discord, messages and random phone calls when being in the same place wasnt possible.
Sometimes I gave Kenneth pages I had written. Other times, one of us would say a couple lines during a conversation and realize there might be a song hiding inside them.
He would take those stories, thoughts and unfinished lines and begin shaping them into lyrics.
Some stories were mine.
Some were his.
Others came from recognizing the same feeling inside two different lives.
Skeleton Sessions is us returning to those lyrics, along with other songs released before, and letting the words carry more of the weight.
We arent trying to erase or replace the original versions. Those songs represent where we were and what we could create with what we had.
We just wanted these versions to feel closer.
Wildfire Thinking actually didnt change very much. We already liked how the original felt, so there wasnt a reason to completely pull it apart.
The new version is still the same song.
It just feels more natural.
The lyrics began with the idea of a mind that doesnt move in a straight line: “My mind skips tracks like a needle on dust. Every quiet thought turns loud on the bus.”
I know that feeling.
One thought begins, then suddenly I’m replaying a conversation from three days ago, wondering what somebody meant and preparing for an ending that hasnt even happened.
That is wildfire thinking.
One small thought catches another until everything inside your head feels like its burning at the same time.
The song also deals with loving somebody when both of you are a little messy. One line says, “I keep rehearsing exits I wont take.”
You can recognize the warning signs, plan an entire goodbye and still stay because something about that person makes you feel understood.
It wasnt written about one exact moment. It grew from conversations about relationships where you already know how you would leave, but part of you is still hoping you wont have to.
Smoke Signals, with Lucas Vale, came from a different kind of conversation.
It is about expecting somebody to notice you are struggling after you have done everything possible to hide it. The song says, “You swallowed storms to keep things calm. You mute your voice to keep the peace.”
I spent alot of my life doing that.
I learned to watch everybody else’s moods before thinking about my own. If something felt wrong, I became quieter and tried not to make the situation worse.
Then I would feel hurt because nobody came looking for me.
But I wasnt sending clear signals.
I was disappearing.
Hoping somebody would understand why.
People cant always read smoke.
Sometimes they know something is wrong but dont know how to reach you. Sometimes they are carrying too much of their own pain to come looking.
Quiet is probably the clearest example of how our conversations became lyrics.
Kenneth and I talked about how easily damage can become normal when you live with it long enough.
You stop calling it panic and say you are just tired.
You dont call it fear. You say you are being careful.
You dont call it damage. You call it another Tuesday night.
The song says, “I was only just surviving, but thats not the same as living.”
Those words came from realizing that functioning doesnt always mean you are okay.
You can work, answer messages and laugh with people while something inside is slowly falling apart. When we returned to Quiet, we didnt need to change the story.
We only wanted to remove some of what stood between the listener and the words.
Monster becomes heavier for the same reason.
That song looks at addiction, abuse and control from the perspective of the person causing the damage. It doesnt excuse anything or turn the abuser into a misunderstood hero.
“I am the abuser, the user, the addict you dont know.”
Kenneth has talked about how Monster came from trying to understand what his son’s mother must have seen when she looked at him during his addiction.
He was carrying his own pain, but the people around him were also being hurt by his actions.
Returning to Monster meant returning to that admission.
The stripped-back version leaves less room to hide from it.
That is what Skeleton Sessions became for us.
It isnt about removing every piece of production or pretending these are completely untouched recordings.
It is about returning to lyrics that began as notebook pages, Discord meetings, voice messages, random phone calls and a few lines we didnt want to forget.
Kenneth and I live in different countries and our stories arent identical, but addiction gave us a language we both understood.
Sometimes we helped each other through it. Sometimes we wrote it down. Sometimes those words became songs.
Now we have returned to those songs and removed some of the layers so we could find the stories underneath them again.
“Some songs begin with a story before they ever become lyrics.”
“You dont always need advice. Sometimes you need somebody who understands.”
“Surviving is not the same as living.”
“Sometimes you have to return to the words to remember why you wrote them.”
Skeleton Sessions is out now. You can listen by following the link below.
Kelsey Rodgers
💜