Music had always been a shared language between Sparklehorse’s Mark Linkous and his younger brother Matt, and as Mark began work on what he planned to be the fifth Sparklehorse album in 2009, the two of them would talk through his plans for the record. Matt can clearly recall their conversations; Mark’s excitement about the influences feeding into it and the way the songs were starting to take shape. It was these conversations that Matt and Melissa - Mark’s sister-in-law, who had both worked with Sparklehorse - returned to years later as they began to sift through boxes of tapes to catalogue and preserve Mark’s unreleased recordings and bring his posthumous album, entitled Bird Machine, to life.

Over the course of four beautiful and otherworldly Sparklehorse records and two Sparklehorse collaborative projects, Mark had built a reputation as one of alternative rock’s most distinctive and influential songwriters. His combination of ghostly static-scarred ballads and thrillingly distorted rock was revered by fellow musicians such as Thom Yorke, PJ Harvey and Tom Waits, all of whom he recorded with, and deeply cherished by his fans. But the intimacy and honesty that made his songs so special also laid bare the troubles that he carried. As he continued to work on his fifth album, recording with Steve Albini in Chicago, and in front of his beloved 1968 Flickinger mixing console at his Static King studio, the depression which had shadowed him for many years began to deepen. On March 6 of 2010 he died by suicide at the age of 48.

Several years later when Matt, Melissa and Bryan Hoffa, an audio preservation specialist at the Library of Congress’ National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, began the painstaking process of listening to and archiving Mark’s recordings, they found the ideas that Mark had discussed with Matt had been vividly and powerfully achieved. A number of the songs were close to completion, while others needed only careful encouragement – the addition of subtle instrumentation and accompanying vocals in some cases, another careful mix in others - to take flight. “It was as though the songs let you know,” says Melissa. “Mark communicated these songs. We just did our best to transmit them.”

From the time that Mark began working on these songs to the record’s imminent release, 14 years have passed, a long time for a collection of tracks that were already well advanced at the time of Mark’s death. But there’s something too in the album’s long and complex gestation - the chaos of old tapes, the love and care that Mark’s family and his close musician friends have shown to every detail - that makes this so distinctively a Sparklehorse record.

It means so much to me, this last batch of beautiful stuff that my brother was putting together,” says Matt. “When I sit down and put on a pair of headphones, I’ll run it all the way through. Everything from “It Will Never Stop” to “Evening Star Supercharger” to “Stay,” that’s Mark just letting it out.”

Released September 8, 2023, Bird Machine is available to order here on limited edition White Vinyl LP, available exclusively at independent record stores, and on CD.

Preorders for local pickup are available as of Friday, September 8th and can be picked up at the main counter in the record store.