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January 12, 2022| Bennie Osborne |FEATURES
“I had a lot of time to focus on making something beautiful out of a horrendous time of my life.” – Wilted Flower on Locked Doors & Hospital Beds
Consistently striving to an open book mentality in connection to their struggles with mental health issues, while staying true to their poeticised string of illuminating consciousness; Wilted Flower has long stood as the proprietors of meaningful acts of bravery in the face of so much adversity, which stands as an incredible testament to the tenacity of the human spirit.
Currently consisting of Micki Woods and Ryan Warriner, their partnership of dreams was born out of a collaborative effort on the production of the fascinatingly tragic odes of Here Lies Our Love, which was released on Valentine’s Day of 2021. Although the various variants of the C word have caused major bumps in the road for artists across the globe, it hasn’t stopped Wilted Flower from producing a new wave of impassioned outpourings, inspired out of deep need to self-reflect and explore the vast caverns of unresolved tension that wrecked the mind and its memory banks.
With an exploration detailing the upsetting realities of living with severe mental health struggles, Chapter 1: Locked Doors & Hospital Beds is a touching composition of lived experiences and thought patterns unravelling layer after layer of serious emotional degradation, in the hopes of obtaining an understanding and appreciation of oneself, which is done in such a simple yet emphatic way.
After our firsthand experience with this dauntlessly raw release, we had to get in touch with lead singer and principle songwriter Micki to learn more about their artistry and process surrounding their latest EP.
Related: Wilted Flower – Chapter 1: Locked Doors & Hospital Beds | EP Review
Firstly, congratulations are in order for recently signing to RoseColoured Records and the release of your latest EP Chapter 1: Locked Doors & Hospital Beds, how have you been feeling in the run up to sharing this exploration?
Micki: “Thank you so much! We’ve been feeling really excited. We’re really honing our sound now and getting more and more confident. I also feel like this is my best writing, which is super exciting but it’s also my most honest and vulnerable. I both hope and don’t hope people relate because it’s such sad, painful music but I hope people find comfort in it like I did when writing it and even now to be honest.”
Some have described your discography as being “beautifully poignant” and “acoustic emo”; we wondered how you would describe your musical journey, for those who maybe haven’t had a chance to check you guys out as of yet?
Micki: “It’s so difficult. We’re always asked our genre and I’m not even sure! I just write what I like, Ryan adds his bits and we run with it! We’ve sort of pinned it down to ambient punk but emo also applies we think! We don’t like to fit in any box and like to hope a wide variety of people like our music and find something they can relate to or enjoy.”
What can we expect out of Locked Doors that you feel differs from your previous releases?
Micki: “We’ve honed our sound more and conformed less to a specific genre and more to just doing what we want to do and hoping people like it! I also think my writing is even more honest than ‘Here Lies Our Love’ which to me is so so important and a key part of what Wilted Flower is.”
Clearly major themes of the record surround thoughts and feelings that were brought to the surface during a hospital admission; what was the process of writing this EP like,whilst you were in the midst of seeking intervention for your mental health?
Micki: “It was intense. I remember writing it all down in a notebook, song after song after song and by the end of it it was falling apart, which feels super relevant to be honest. I often find it quite easy to write when I’m depressed, sometimes it does just flow out of me and I try not to rewrite any of it once I feel better and let it be its raw and honest self. You can actually check out the live demos that I recorded in the hospital on our album ‘Demos from a Hospital Bed’ including the demo for the single ‘My Next Cigarette Burn’.
In reflecting back on this experience through a creative outlet, was there anything you felt particularly surprised to have unearthed?
Micki: “I was surprised at how many songs I wrote and how coherent they are! Sometimes when you’re so poorly it’s hard to make sense of things so it did surprise me how confident I feel releasing these songs as they were written but authenticity has always been so important to me in general, but especially in my art.”
Besides previously mentioned themes, what other influences do you feel shaped the creation of Locked Doors?
Micki: “I listened to a lot of The Cranberries and Sufjan Stevens when I was in hospital so I think those influences snuck in for sure, musically. Personally, I’ve struggled for a long while so hospital was just a good place to sit and write and reflect on things I’ve struggled with in the past and still do. I had a lot of time to focus, as best I could, on making something beautiful out of a frankly horrendous time of my life.”
What has been your biggest takeaway over the course of producing this record?
Micki: “That my partner is amazing. I wrote these songs alone and Ryan’s been able to take them and make them what they are today which I think is magical. He’s self taught production wise and this is only very recently and I think this EP really shows how much he’s improved since his first proper release (our last album) and yeah, Wilted Flower wouldn’t have turned into what it is without him! I’m so excited to watch us both grow musically and keep pushing the boundaries with every release.”
What would you like listeners to take away from experiencing Locked Doors & Hospital Beds?
Micki: “That something beautiful can come from the darkest of places. Very cliche but important. I didn’t think I’d make it out alive but I did and I know that even if things get so awful again that I can fight it and it will be okay, whether it feels like it or not at the time.”
Do you have any advice or insight you would like to share with those who have or had similar struggles?
Micki: “Try to use it for good, or even just less bad. It’s so difficult, but whatever creative outlet you have, use it. Even if you think it’s crap, do it anyway. It doesn’t need to be for others, I didn’t think anyone would hear these songs, i wrote for me to get myself through it. Also, it will be okay. It’s so overused and seems simple which as we know life isn’t, but it really will be. You’ve come so far from things you never thought you’d survive and you’ll do it again and again. Not that it’s easy, but I always tell myself to take it one day at a time, sometimes an hour at a time, if thats all you can do, that’s more than enough. Keep going!”
Considering part of your latest EP is called Chapter 1, should we be keeping our eyes peeled for Chapter 2 any time soon?
Micki: “Absolutely. We have lots of plans for this year that we can’t wait to share with everyone, there’s a hell of a lot to come so keep your eyes and ears peeled!”
And finally, what are your hopes for 2022? Any plans for live shows etc.?
Micki: “We’re hoping to be able to play any shows at all given the current climate, we love playing live and much like every musician I imagine, it’s been really tough. We do have some exciting shows coming up including a show in Sheffield with Slash Fiction and Nervus in aid of football for food banks. We’ve never played Sheffield so we can’t wait for that. It was rescheduled and the new date will be shared soon! Other than that, nothing concrete but we want to get to as many places as we can.”
