Will you help us make our 6th Album?

 Last winter was a deep one, smothered in snow and made colder by doubts about how much longer we could hold on to the art of making songs. After a decade of relentless creative work which produced 5 albums, we realized that we had been working for next to nothing, breaking even or going into debt to bring these songs to your ears.    

We watched our musical tribe drown in the tsunami of music streaming as corporations like Spotify devalued our work, paying pennies per year. Our musician friends moved to cheaper states or stopped recording. The few who kept creating music survived by the grace of donations from their fans who saw their struggle and rose like bonfires, warming their nights, urging them on. Their fans paid for European tours, vinyl albums, CD’s, hotels, rent, software, guitars, diapers and mandolins. Their fans shouted, “We’ll pay the bills if you make the music!” 

Recently, a duo raised $40,000 to sustain them as they make a new album. We've seen this kind of generosity too, in fans who handed us checks which read: Keep Going! Or Your Music Matters! We even have fans who donate each month to remind us of our mission. To those of you who have kept the broccoli in our bowls and our wheels on the road, Thank you! 

Fan funding seems to be the only remaining path to sustainably making & releasing music anymore. We just can’t keep creating alone. How can we keep working with little income? If you can help us, we’ll keep making music. If you can’t, we’ll find other work to pay bills. 

It’s hard to ask for money. It feels like begging. But if billionaire politicians can do it in order to destroy, why can’t we do it to create? 

Will you help us create a new Winterlings album? We’re ready to work hard on new songs so that we can hand you an album you can be proud of and, while you wait, we’ll offer you other creative work – from handwritten lyrics to Wolff’s paintings (www.ThePaintedPoet.com) – as rewards for keeping our music alive. You can also just donate, or have us send your reward to someone else as a holiday gift. 

Campaign Details 

We planned to run this crowdfunding campaign for one month but had multiple donors who needed extra time to make donations (some are promised for early 2020) so we're keeping our fingers crossed and the donations open.   

We hope to raise between $16K- 34K to pay for expenses during the 8-12 month album creation and launch process.   

We'll keep you updated on our progress via emails and the blog on this page. We’ll also keep you updated as we make the album! 

Your donation will help us cover: 

Gas for heat 

Electricity 

Water  

Food 

Automotive Expenses 

Production 

Rehearsal 

Recording 

Mixing 

Mastering 

Software 

Internet / Web Services 

Album Art Design 

CD Replication 

Postage / Shipping

Stretch Goals with Additional Funding 

Hiring Session Musicians 

Radio Campaign 

Press Campaign 

Touring  

Videography 

We’d love to give each song what it deserves, which is often a month of solid days. 

We hope to have the album finished by Summer or Fall of 2020. 

To select art (examples at www.ThePaintedPoet.com), Wolff will send you images of available art via text or email. If you prefer to meet in person to choose art or make a donation, let us know. We will pay for shipping and delivery of all rewards to the best of our ability. If you live in Sweden, you might have to help... 

The DONATE button is a non-tax gift to our musical mission, whereas the "Rewards" buttons are considered "sales" and are taxable (for WA residents) by the State of Washington. Out of staters shouldn't incur tax for any reward. 

We have a HOUSE CONCERT REWARD for donations over 1K, but use the donate button because it’s an experience, so not taxable. 

Feel free to reach out if you'd like to make alternative arrangements to support us other than Paypal, as they also take 3% + .30 from each donation.  

If you can’t donate, shout! We still love you. Help us spread the word on social media and through grassroots connections. 

Questions?  Send us an email at info at Winterlings.com or give us a call. 

We thank you and think of you every day as we strum and sing and pay for the things we need to keep our songs moving from our hearts into your ears. 

Together we can make magnificent art. 

Love, 

The Winterlings

Join our mailing list for crowdfunding updates

Please Consider Donating via Venmo @Wolffpoet (Jay Bowden) or Zelle (206)271-4677 or get old fashioned and send a check.  No fees for these, so your donation goes 100% to music making.  We don't have links for these as you need to use app or bank. 

Album Vision:

We’ve got a heavy litter of pups here, some still a bit blind, but all ready to thrive. We’re going to balance heavy Americana with earth hymns, our medicine for despair. Some of you have heard “I’m Like A Tree” and we even have an early mix of it on our website.

Working Songlist: 

“Last Man on The Mountain” The story of Jimmy Weekly of Pigeonroost Holler, West Virginia who was the final holdout as coal companies chopped the top off of the mountains around him. 

“Less a Father, More a Fool”-A dying father’s rage at his son’s homosexuality ends when he finds another boy hanging by a noose in his barn. 

“Mama’s Dog”-The American tradition of sexual assault is confronted in a song about a coon hound fighting a bear. True story of Wolff’s Mom’s dog who died fighting. 

“Oh, Loretta”-A southern girl steals a pistol to kill the priest who has been abusing her little brother. 

“The Devil’s Got Crawfish Pie”-A naked man runs through a campground where the devil, alligators and a swamp werewolf called the Rougarou lurk in Spanish moss. 

"Rise" An earth hymn about how fast our lives race by and how, in the end, we're all gonna rise. 

"This is My Church, We call it The Earth" A song celebrating the planet on which we all live, inspired by our tour last year from the painted canyons of Utah to the bayou of Louisiana. 

"I'm Like a Tree" We've played this Earth Hymn in churches and outside under cedars. A remembrance of how much we are blessed by sharing this planet with plants. 

For a taste of what we’re cooking, give a listen to a live video of “The Devil’s got Crawfish Pie” over on our YouTube channel.

Album Making Magic 

In spite of a wild ride on the roller coaster of 2020, we're steadily giving birth to audio waves and recording songs, instrument by instrument and track by track! Through quarantine, smoke storm, deluge and financial hardship, we continue to be inspired by your faith and commitment to stand beside us as we make new music! For those who wish to hear us live, we've been livestreaming concerts on Facebook, and for those who are excited about new songs coming, we hope to have an album in your hands by Winter! 

 

Corona Music 

We've lost all our upcoming shows, so your support means more than ever now as temperatures continue to dip down to freezing and we take deep breaths during rainstorms, hoping the pandemic will pass.

As we continue to work on recording new songs, we have been asked by a number of fans if we'd do a livestream, so we're going to appear on Facebook Live on Saturday March 28 at 5PM Pacific / 8PM Eastern and sing some stripped down acoustic songs into the phone...Join us if you can!

Through The Snow and into Sunlight 

In spite of our shy, little silence, we have been working on the new album! Finding the tempo on "Last Man on The Mountain" required us to play it and record it about 30 times but we locked it in and Amanda has added some gorgeous violin parts. Now, we're digging into a song called "Loretta" while also working on the next stages of "Last Man on The Mountain." You can read the lyrics here...With a gun and a predatory priest and a backcountry heroine, this one is pure Americana. "Loretta" reflects the courage, sadness and frustration so many Americans have been feeling lately with regards to violence and abuse so we hope the song might become an outlet (sing it loud!) and an anthem for those of us who need to scream. It's always better to sing than to scream~ The Winterlings. 

Lots of love an thanks to those who have continued to send us support in 2020 including Lisa (long time supporter), Rohan (contributed last year, too!) and Peter (aka Randolff the Ogre) whose generosity and friendship have been steadfast for decades. 

Into The New Year 

We rolled through Thanksgiving reflecting on you, the many generous music lovers who have supported us thus far. We're so blessed to be on this journey with you at such a strange time in recording history when big box stores are selling vinyl records and streaming services are giving music away.

Here's a little crowdfunding story of how our music moves through the world: Through a video sent by one of our supporters, we learned that her grandson, age 6, was rocking out to "Crawlspace" on his mini electric, but didn't seem to be strumming the actual chords of the song. Wolff jumped into action, polishing up a dusty lyrics sheet so the young musician would have the ability to play the song as it was written. Grandma got him a capo and now he's turning the silence to song!

We ended Thanksgiving week at around 25% to our goal, giving us another 75% to reach for, so we decided t carry our crowdfunding campaign into the new year. We also have a substantial pledge of funding from a long time supporter who we hope to see next week! Once those funds are in place, we'll be in much better shape in terms of budgeting the steps to get this new litter of song pups howling! If you still want to give, but need more time, feel free to join us whenever you're ready. All your support will launch us into 2020 with the sonic fireworks of meaningful music! 

Also, for Puget Sound Locals, we have ONE SHOW THIS DECEMBER! Verity Credit Union in Lynnwood (Alderwood Mall) with Santa Claus, Saturday, Dec. 14, 11am-1pm!

Three Weeks in and Three Thousand Dollars 

Yesterday we received a kind donation from Canada and a check from Seattle pushed us up to 18% of our goal. We don't have very much time left, but we're dedicated to making the album so please join us if you can! Thanksgiving is fast approaching and we have so many of you to thank, including a long time fan who gave Wolff a new hiking backpack, which, if you know his wild spirit, is kind of like a Bible, a way to help enter the mystery. There was a lot of rain today, but we can still hear a bird singing in the trees.

 

A Week and a Half into the Winter 

It's been a cold week of lovely surprises including a visit from KSER DJ Ron Taffi and gifts from Scotland, Alaska and a surprise check in the mail which pushed our donations up to $1255! That means we've only got 92% to go to reach our first album making goal and three weeks left! We got a donation of a box of beets which we've been eating like gophers and Wolff's been in the studio figuring out the tempo of "Last Man on The Mountain" Here's a video of him playing it with a video filter that makes him look like a coal miner:

Thank you to everyone who is joining us on the journey and those of you who are about to! We appreciate your support! A & W 

Four Days into the Dream of a New Album 

After four days of asking you for help, we've raised over $700 and heard some inspiring stories of just why you want us to make more Winterlings songs. One contributor thanked our song "Long May You Live" for getting her through the toughest year of her life. Another filmmaking fan made it a priority to send us a donation before climbing on an airplane for Michoacan to shoot the Dia De Los Muertos celebrations. Another, in Germany, told us the story of his descent into a labyrinth of sickness, sadness and poverty only to be pulled up and out of it by a wounded bird along a roadside. Your stories have been as moving as your contributions and we're honored to have a songmaking family standing beside us, like Theo beside Vincent Van Gogh, as we push forward into the work of wrestling meaningful music out of the silence. Thank you for shining light on your Winterlings as we set out into the snow.