Big Red Machine - Phoenix (feat. Fleet Foxes & Anaïs Mitchell)

In Our Headphones

KEXP

Music, Music Commentary

4.4 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 24 September 2021

⏱️ 4 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Big Red Machine - "Phoenix (feat. Fleet Foxes & Anaïs Mitchell)" from the 2021 album How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last? on 37d03d.

Last month, The National’s Aaron Dessner and Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon released their second album under the name Big Red Machine, titled How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last?. The album features a heavyweight line-up of guests, including Taylor Swift, Sharon Van Etten, This Is The Kit, Ben Howard, Naeem, Lisa Hannigan, My Brightest Diamond’s Shara Nova, and on today's Song of the Day, Robin Pecknold of Fleet Foxes and Tony Award-winning singer/songwriter Anaïs Mitchell.

"'Phoenix' was one of the last songs we wrote for this record," Dessner says via a press release. "I was thinking about The Band and the Grateful Dead... maybe imagining this Big Red Machine album was some version of The Last Waltz. Justin first heard it while driving and immediately the chorus melody came into his head. I shared the sketch with Robin Pecknold, who I've been a fan of forever and who I'd been dreaming would join us on this record. Robin wrote the verses and pre chorus as a kind of dialogue with Justin, recalling a conversation they once had backstage in Phoenix. Later Anais wrote words to the chorus and The Westerlies added their magic to the instrumental. JT Bates rumbles around in rare form on the drums on this song. I think it's what I always imagined Big Red Machine would sound like."

Pecknold adds, “It was a high, high honor to work on this song, and beyond that it was a really interesting creative challenge. Justin’s vocals and the beautiful chorus were already in place before I got my hands on it, so I felt my job melodically and lyrically was to set his entrance up in the best possible way. I felt like a pilgrim putting questions to an elusive sage, not needing clear answers, but happy for the chance to ask.”

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Howdy in the loading daylight, watching the fog receive, divided the flame you slowly gave
0:29.0	to me, side of your leaf in my mind, but I only caught you the one time. Later I'd
0:41.4	watch you wonder what it was like. How do you bear the full way? How does the long
0:52.4	way feel? Needing your hand too tight against the wheel? How do you stay in that tower? How
1:05.1	do you make in your own power? How does the wheel not turn on? On our own? On our own?
1:15.3	I was trying to find my way, I was thinking my mind was made, but you were making my heart
1:24.2	change, it's all I could take, I was trying to find my way, I was thinking my mind was
1:35.0	made, but you were making my heart change, it's all I could take.
2:05.0	How do you bear the full way? How does the long way feel? Needing your hand too tight against
2:21.0	the wheel? How do you stay in that tower? How do you make in your own power? How does the
2:33.0	wheel not turn on? On our own? I was trying to find my way, I was thinking my mind was
2:45.0	made, but you were making my heart change, it's all I could take, I was trying to find my
2:56.0	way, I was thinking my mind was made, but you were making my heart change, it's all I could
3:05.0	take, I was trying to find my way, I was thinking my mind was
3:12.0	made, but you were making my heart change, it's all I could take, I was trying to find my
3:23.0	way, I was thinking my mind was made, but you were making my heart change, it's all I
3:33.0	could take, I was trying to find my way, I was thinking my mind was made, but you were making my heart
3:38.0	How does the long we feel?
3:41.5	How does the real nut turn on our own?
3:47.0	Our own flowers
3:52.7	Was taking up a
4:08.0	You
	...

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