The Making of "Broadwings"
Coal, covered in rain, up on the trails…
"King of the Rails," the opening track on the debut EP from Jeff Stempka and the Passin’ Thrus, immediately takes you to a place: a frozen rust belt city, weary and wondering if its golden years have passed – not unlike the wayfaring protagonist in the song itself.
Behind the singer’s lonely plea, lush instrumentation and bonfire harmonies provide the warmth of a heavy, waxed canvas jacket. And therein lies the creative ethos of the Passin’ Thrus: It’s not where you are, but what you surround yourself with, that matters most.
The Passin’ Thrus are a music collective dispersed between Nashville, Tennessee and southern Pennsylvania: Jeff Stempka (acoustic guitar, vocals) in Nashville; Mark Omiatek (electric guitar, lap steel) in York, Pennsylvania; and Pat Doyle (acoustic guitar, bass, vocals) and Abby Badach Doyle (fiddle, vocals) in Pittsburgh.
Simply put: If they shared a ZIP code, they’d probably book some gigs and call themselves a band. But with satisfying lives (and day jobs) in separate cities, the four longtime friends agreed to lean into the transitory nature of the project.
Chemistry outweighs convenience, after all.
The Passin’ Thrus chipped away at the "Broadwings" EP during immersive co-writing and recording weekends from May 2021 through September 2022.
At times, the Passin’ Thrus’ exhilarating weekends in the studio – staggered between weeks or months apart – brought forth a compressed emotional intensity when they reunited to collaborate, not unlike any other long-distance relationship.
But keeping the friendship intact – and the music rooted in joy – remained a North Star for the group. They emerged from the project with a new appreciation for shared vulnerability and gentle, courageous conversations during the creative process. (Only one throw pillow was set on fire in the making of the record – and it was an accident, Scout’s honor.)
In its five tracks, “Broadwings” explores themes of transformation, redemption and moving on – both from the perspective of those taking flight and those left behind.
Stempka, a self-proclaimed “reluctant frontman,” is the driving force behind the Passin’ Thrus. In the isolation of early pandemic lockdowns, he quit drinking and embarked on a somewhat obsessive project to comb through notebooks, voice memos and hard drives to inventory every song he’d ever written. Then, he logged them in an Excel PivotTable – there were hundreds – where each song was cataloged with metadata and given a quality score.
In February 2021, Stempka released four of those songs on a solo acoustic EP, “Songs from Pennsylvania,” but was still craving a bigger sound. He brought three songs from his pandemic inventory project to the Passin' Thrus: “Home is a Word” (retitled to “King of the Rails”), “To the Bone” and “El Ocho." The group workshopped the writing and rounded out full-band arrangements for the studio.
The album was recorded and mixed by Dan Scalise at Acoustic Anomaly Laboratories in Pittsburgh, a logical meeting spot for the geographically dispersed (but Western Pennsylvania rooted) collective.
The EP also features Pittsburgh musicians Bill Schill (Locks and Dams) on drums and Valerie Vizzini (Uptown Rhythm and Brass) on backing vocals. The “Broadwings” EP was mastered by Grammy-nominated engineer Justin Francis, who has worked on projects for notable artists including Kacey Musgraves, Tyler Childers and Little Big Town.
The title track, “Waiting on the Broadwings,” is the only song written uniquely for the EP. Inspired by a chat with volunteer bird migration counters at the Allegheny Front Hawk Watch, the song was a fast and unexpected collaboration between Badach Doyle and Omiatek during a group writing weekend in the Laurel Highlands. (Stempka stepped out to take a quick shower when the two were jamming in the living room; by the time he dried off, the song was finished.)
Omiatek’s ethereal steel guitar evokes the feeling of birds soaring on updrafts and thermals along the Allegheny Plateau. This imagery also inspired the album art, which Omiatek painted in his York, Pennsylvania, studio.
Badach Doyle’s “Great Escape,” first performed as an acoustic ballad with the Doyles’ folk trio Gem City Revival, resurfaces on the EP with Stempka singing lead. The song gets a ‘90s jangle pop treatment and an unexpected hit of adrenaline, thanks to Schill’s masterful use of the toms and Doyle’s impressive debut on bass.
So, what’s next for the Passin’ Thrus? Clocking in at 700 miles apart, your guess is as good as theirs – although “Broadwings” sparked an eagerness for future collaborations.
As the group celebrates the hard-earned release of their debut EP, perhaps it’s best summed up in these lines from “Waiting on the Broadwings”: Try to ride the magic / Try to chase the high… Don’t know where I’m going, but it’s time to fly.
