everything that blooms wrecks me is a limited self-release of 11 original songs. i wrote these songs in various places & spaces between california, the oregon coast, baja south, west texas & austin, texas. they were recorded in the hill country outside san marcos & at cacophony recorders in east austin with producer darwin smith. there are moments of darkness & moments of reprieve in these songs, just as there were in the experiences that led them into being. at many moments i wondered if i would ever finish this album. by the end i was graced by the talents & insights of many wonderful friends & musicians.

to save a few trees & in mind of my own budget & aesthetics, i have chosen to self-release everything that blooms in a limited number, & to hand-make the cd jackets & inserts with handmade paper & assorted photographs. (the discs themselves are professionally mastered & pressed however.) in this way i am hoping that each packaged cd will be unique.

this is a fully independent venture & so i thank you very humbly & very gratefully for all your support & listening.

i hope you will enjoy this music!

about the songs:
"everything that blooms wrecks me" - a halo spinning around one's heart, the curse of being able to feel but not knowing what to do in the face of suffering, the curse of being witness to but unable to alleviate anyone else's pain, let alone your own.

"caller of spirit" - i wrote this late, late one night with three kittens blinking reassuringly at me from the bed, telling me i was entering some place of mystery they agreed with. this one goes out to all those i've known who venture into dark territories & do not make it all the way back tho i hope they will.

"silver" - this came to me all at once in one afternoon. it is about being a single mother & a woman walking a less-traveled path. my mother was a single mother & once told me she felt "rich" at the time becuz of her life experiences. this is the first time i have sincerely quoted my mother in a song. silver is less coveted than gold, yet some of us will choose it over gold.

"lebanon missouri" - i drove thru this part of the country once & remembered an old friend of mine i had not yet forgotten. we had made a promise a long time ago to meet again one day on top of a pyramid (a tongue-in-cheek nod to a cliched kind of romanticism) but the date went by & it did not happen. i wrote this song, innocently, about four years before he at last did reappear in my life.

"seeds in the ashes" - this image is maybe one of the most crucial amid all these songs - the hope of planting something, re-finding something, despite all the wreckage we have gone thru.

(even more about the album here)

the musicians:
dao strom - vocals, harmonies, guitars
kevin fox - upright bass, electric guitar, harmonies
billy brent malkus - dobro, electric guitar on "caller of spirit"
darwin smith - electric guitars, ebow, harmonies, bells & keys
joseph santori - cello
brian beken - fiddle, mandolin
kullen fuchs - piano, accordion, rhodes
jimmy way - drums, sound engineer
aimee bobruk - harmonies on "fields of ca" & "sweetness"