Calexico / Iron And Wine - Years To Burn (LP)

Some collaborations feel like a quick handshake, a pleasant detour before everyone goes back to their own lane. Years to Burn feels more like old friends settling back into a favourite conversation. Calexico and Iron & Wine first crossed paths on the 2005 EP In the Reins, then spent years circling each other on tours and festivals. Their full‑length finally arrived in June 2019 via Sub Pop and City Slang, and it wears that long simmer beautifully. The record is short, but not slight. It has the patience and confidence of artists who know exactly where the songs want to go.

The first thing you notice is the blend. Sam Beam’s voice still lands like warm light on woodgrain, but Joey Burns and John Convertino pull the frame wider, letting desert‑air brass, tremolo guitar and murmuring percussion bend the horizon. What Heaven’s Left glides on a gentle sway, the kind of melody Beam could write in his sleep, yet the arrangement blooms with Calexico’s palette, piano and trumpet slipping in like afternoon shadows. Midnight Sun keeps that gentle momentum, riding a steady pulse and close harmonies that make you lean closer rather than reach for the volume.

Father Mountain is the instant keeper, a stately waltz that feels like an old folk standard you somehow missed. It was singled out by listeners for good reason, and the Grammys took notice too, with the album earning a nomination for Best Americana Album at the 62nd Annual Grammy Awards. You can hear why across the set. The trio of Beam, Burns and Convertino avoid fuss, letting tiny choices do the heavy lifting, a brush of snare, a soft pedal steel sigh, a trumpet line that passes through like a half‑remembered story.

Then there is The Bitter Suite, the most expansive bit of writing here, a three‑part piece that stitches Calexico’s border‑town reveries to Iron & Wine’s hush. It starts like a mirage, picks up flickers of rhythm and colour, then drifts out again, as if you’ve driven past a scene you’ll keep thinking about for weeks. It is a reminder that this partnership can do more than just tidy duets. It can stretch and wander without losing the thread.

Part of the magic sits in the way they recorded it. They tracked the album in Nashville with producer Matt Ross‑Spang, a detail that makes sense when you hear the roomy drums and unfussy microphone craft. Nothing here feels airless. You can hear fingers on strings and breath in brass, the kind of intimate detail that rewards a good set‑up at home. On Years to Burn vinyl, that sense of space turns into a small cinema. Side A draws you into its glow, side B deepens the colours and leaves a faint echo in the room when the needle lifts.

Calexico fans will catch familiar shades, a trumpet reach here, a dust‑hazed guitar there, while Iron & Wine diehards will feel at home in Beam’s careful phrasing and campfire warmth. The songs avoid gaudy turns, and the tempos favour walking pace, but it never drifts into background music. The writing is tight, the playing sure, and the chemistry easy in the best way. If you’ve been hunting for Calexico albums on vinyl, this sits neatly beside Feast of Wire and Carried to Dust, a different mood but the same care with space and texture. And if you collect Iron & Wine vinyl, it bridges the early lo‑fi hush and the later, bigger band work with a quiet elegance.

Critics heard it, too. Reviews from outfits like Pitchfork and The Guardian praised the unforced interplay and the subtle arrangements, and fans embraced it on tour, where these songs grew a little looser and a touch brighter. You can imagine them on a Sunday in your own lounge, a record to cue when the afternoon light starts leaning orange.

If you love browsing a Melbourne record store or you buy Calexico records online from your favourite indie, put this near the top of the list. It is a modest album in all the right ways, generous with detail and free of pretence, the kind of set that keeps revealing new corners with each spin. Years to Burn vinyl belongs in any shelf that prizes songwriting, atmosphere and the quiet thrill of great players listening to each other. In a year crowded with louder statements, this one found its power by whispering, then letting the room carry the rest.