Album Notes

Here is Big Old Life: twelve songs from a band that has learned to count its blessings. You could call it agnostic gospel. You could call it reverent (except when it’s not). You could call it a foot-stompin', musical shout-out to the universe. You could call it a recording of four people playing songs they like, together, as they've done for the past seven years. Big Old Life is also everything Rani Arbo & daisy mayhem fans have always loved about the band: live energy, dry wit, great grooves, smart lyrics, and a wild ride through a blend of roots music styles, from blues to bluegrass to old-time, folk, funk, and swing.

Musically, this album showcases the band’s stellar singing, with Rani Arbo's gorgeous, shape-shifting alto buoyed by the band's renowned four-part harmonies. Guitarist Anand Nayak and bassist Andrew Kinsey contribute strong originals, as well, while Scott Kessel (Arbo's husband) lines up the groove on the Drumship Enterprise, a junk percussion rig featuring tin cans, cookie tins, and a vinyl suitcase (he does pull out a traditional kit for a few tunes). Arbo’s swervy fiddle and Nayak’s versatile guitar weave together with energy and abandon, and superb playing from guests Rose Sinclair (banjo, accordion), Kevin Barry (lap steel, guitar) and Ben Ross (harmonica) rounds out the album’s soulful sound.

Many of the tracks on Big Old Life peer through a universal window. Arbo's title track and the anthemic “Shine On” lobby for a fearless, bright-eyed approach to life; Nayak's swingy “What's That” looks outside "the door" with a Waits-meets-Grappelli swing; Kinsey's hushed "Mother of Our Dreams" and Arbo's unearthly "Hole in Heaven" are paeans to mothers living and remembered. Then there's the straight-up gospel blues, “Oil in My Vessel,” learned from fiddler Joe Thompson, and a clawhammer banjo version of Leonard Cohen's “Heart with No Companion,” a tender ode to possibility. Interspersed are a fistful of songs with more classic themes — love lost, the trouble with red haired boys, and a Dylan tune, “Farewell Angelina,” that aptly reflects the chaos of our modern world.

Along with great music and singing, Rani Arbo & daisy mayhem have always had a penchant for the spiritual. But where their previous album, Gambling Eden, asked big questions, Big Old Life simply opens the window and lets the light in. Listen to their playing, to their song choices, and to the ease in which they inhabit their sound, and you’ll hear the difference.

As Arbo says, “The shorter your life feels, the bigger it is in the moment.”

Big Old Life is the sound of that moment.