Violets are Blue
Released in 2015
$12.00
Violets Are Blue is an album of love songs from the kaleidoscopic perspective of midlife. It’s hopeful, truth-telling and wry, with a wide sonic palette and guest appearances from friends old and new.
Anand oversaw production at Chris Rival’s for this one, and we used the studio to full advantage, layering sounds and having more than the usual fun with arrangements. We added Anand’s lap steel, mandolin from bluegrass master Joe Walsh, Cajun accordion from Dirk Powell, backup vocals from May Erlewine, and a string trio for the album closer. Rani wrote half of these tunes; Anand composed the powerful “If I’m One,” and we found covers from May Erlewine, James Hill, James Armenti, Danny Schmidt and Fred Rose.
- Heart of the World
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
My blue day was turned around by a walk through Middletown, as I let my quirky neighborhood remind me I’m not alone. There’s so much beauty and humanity out there (and inside); the hard part is getting out of your head enough to notice it. — RA
I got a drummer man beating his drum
Shouting I love you to everyone
I got a baby, going on nine
Stepping out in the world, he’s catching on fireI got a feeling I’m falling down
Cause every now and then I can’t hear the sound
Of the heart of the world
Beating next to this girlI got a low down I got a hole
I gotta slow down, let go
out of my front door, thinking I should
Take a walk around the neighborhoodI got a foot in front of the other
I got a phone call to my brother
New York City, tell him I love him and
Listen to the heart of the worldMan on a bicycle gave me a smile
Tattoo lady she’s running her mile
Boy with a camera is chasing the sun
There’s something out here for everyoneAnd the beautiful girls are all over town
With their eyes and their boots, and their hair hanging down
And what if I’m grey? I can still hear the heart of the world
Beating next to this girlIt’s hard to remember that silence is golden
When I feel beholden to fight
But the words I say inside all day
Make it so I ain’t listening right to the heart of the worldI got a drummer man beating his drum
Shouting I love you to everyone
I got a baby going on nine
Stepping out in the world, he’s catching on fire - Down by the Water
James Armenti (deVague Music, BMI)
First heard covered by our longtime favorite The Blood Oranges, this song arrives fully aged and coated with a classic country patina, despite being written in the 80’s by local legend Jim Armenti. You won’t be looking at turbines, dams, and sluices the same way again. — AK
Down by the water where the big dam is standing
I met Corinna last night
While the pale moon was sinking
We lay there drinking
And listening to our heartsDown by the water with the steel turbines humming
I held Corinna last night
When the big sluice was open
The river went running
And turned on the lightsDown by the water, I thought I knew
Down by the water, quick as the dew
Down by the waterCool was the air through the folds of her hair
As she told me to listen once more
And I heard the wind making waves on the water
That reached for the shoreSo many reasons like drops from a raincloud
We could have been talking all night
Instead she just left me and I watched the river
Drain out of sightDown by the water where the big dam is standing
I met Corinna last night
While the pale moon was sinking
I lay there drinking and listening to my heartDown the water, I fell apart
Down by the water, right from the start
Down by the water, quick as the dew
Down by the water - Keep it in Mind
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
On the day I wrote it, this song was a prescription. I’d dropped my fourth-grader at school and was driving home by a small state park — 8:05 a.m., and already I was distracted, anxious, and buzzing. I pulled over, stopped, and worked this one out on the trail. Been glad to have it in the medicine cabinet ever since. — RA
Feel your wheels on the road
And your hands on the wheel
Watch the way that the world
Makes you feel
Is it a heavy load
Or lighter than air?
Feel your wheels on the road
It will take you somewhereIt will take you somewhere
It’ll bring you right there
Back to the middle
And the still small voice
Says I am what I am and I am right here
And I am with you in the starlight honey
And we’re gonna shine
Keep it in mindFeel your feet on the ground
In the crunch of the snow
You know your boots make a sound
Wherever you go
Is it sweet as a whistle
Or sad like a song?
Feel your boots on the ground
And you won’t step wrongAnd you won’t step wrong
And it won’t take long
Getting to the middle and the still, small voice
Says I am what I am and I’m gonna be strong
And I am with you in the starlight honey, and we’re gonna shine
Keep it in mindKeep your ear on the river
On the whippoorwill call
On the quiet of an evening
On the rise and fall
Is it cryin’ out to you?
Is it whispering?
You gotta lean in
Keep listening
It’s getting busy in the world
It’s getting busy in my head
I get dizzy when I try to find a place to be instead
Feel your wheels on the road
And your boots on the ground
Listen to the rise and fall
Try to put it downGo on and put it down
Go on and let it ring
Get back the middle
And the still, small voice
Says I am what I am and this is the thing
I am with you in the starlight honey, and we’re gonna shine
Keep it in mindOooh, I am with you in the starlight honey, and we’re gonna shine
No matter what we do
Keep it in mind - Walk around the Wheel
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
Rani’s mother has requested, for many years now, more love songs from the band. Not sure this — a sea shanty for marriage — is what she had in mind. Shanties are basically work songs that help sailors work in sync (not to mention keep spirits up during long journeys or rough seas). Without them, momentum is lost and accidents happen — nothing you want in the middle of the Atlantic, or in a marriage, for that matter. — AK
Cat’s in the kitchen hungry, honey, way oh way oh
I’m in the garden plantin’ money, way oh
Fixing to dine on bread and gravy, way oh way oh
Dreaming of fine things for my baby, away
Walk around the wheel
Tell me baby how you feel
Steady now on the keel that we lay down
Hold fast the line, we’re gonna run it baby one more time
And one more time when it comes roundGot a little cuppa coffee honey, way oh way oh
Gave up a seat on the subway, baby, way oh
Girl in the middle’s a junkie, honey, way oh way oh
You know I ain’t got a stone to throw, honey, away
Meet me when the stars are shining, honey, way oh, way oh
Meet me with the day behind me, honey, way oh,
Somewhere the sun is always shining, way oh, way oh
Sometimes you feel your thread unwinding away… - You Should See Me Now
James Hill (James Hill, SOCAN)
There’s nothing like looking at a first love through the telescope of passing time. That memory can remain larger than life, even as those who remember it suspect they have changed beyond recognition. Ukulele virtuoso James Hill penned this poignant gem, but we have the gall to play it on banjo. — AK
There was a time I was so young
The little voice inside me carried a gun
Those were the days I couldn’t lose
The only thing that didn’t dare come near me was the bluesBut you should see me now
You’d barely recognize me my own true loveRemember when we thought we knew
The color that a love would go if it was true
Way back then, back at the start
I couldn’t give you more than the song inside my heartWhile merrily we rolled along
Something unseen went silently wrong
And by the time we ran ashore
I could not imagine how to love you any moreWell, you will know me by my name
Some things about a man just never change
And you will know me by my eyes
Still watching for you on the horizon - Swing Me Down
Danny Schmidt (Danny Schmidt Publishing, SESAC)
We met Danny Schmidt at the RiverRoots festival in Madison, Indiana. He is a great writer, someone who really plays with language and can say a lot while keeping it simple. This is a dance tune, a celebration and an admission (or maybe a recognition) of weakness. I love its circular, reeling feel and the sudden poetry of the lines “like a dandelion sneeze or a cloud that’s raining thirst, there’s a love that swings around us spreading seeds upon the earth”. We were fortunate to catch Dirk Powell in a moment of weakness and get him to turn up the party with his squeezebox. — AN
Swing me down old Carolina, swing me back Virginia
Swing the girl who takes you home, swing the girl that brings ya
Hey, hey hey…I wake up every morning and I sleep most every night
And I drive but still the highway just keeps bending out of sight
Then I ride until the sunset bows its head down to the light
And I bow down to my partner and we promenade all nightSwing me down to old Wyoming, swing me back Dakota
Swing the girl who cleans you up, swing the girl that broke ya
Hey, hey hey…There’s one likes to Lindy and there’s one who likes to sway
There’s one who likes to lead and then there’s one who likes to stray
And you’re crazy if you leave and just as crazy if you stay
Cause there’s something about the way the caller’s callin’ it todaySwing me down old Arkansas, swing me back-lahoma
Swing the girl who rents your heart, swing the girl that owns ya
Hey, hey, hey…So burn me down a dance floor and blur me down a line
Turn me down the chance before I chance to make you mine
Cause it’s the holler of the heart that leads the making of the mind
It’s not that I don’t love you, I’m in love with your whole kindSwing me down old Colorado, swing me back Nebraska
Swing the girl who tells you what, swing the girl that asks ya
Hey, hey hey….Can’t promise it’s a blessing but I swear it’s not a curse
To love, to love so much it might just make a heart to burst
Like a dandelion sneeze, like a cloud that’s raining thirst
There’s a love that swings around us spreading seeds upon the EarthSwing me down old Illinois, swing me back Missouri
Swing the girl that boils your blood, swing the girl that stirs ya
Hey, hey hey… - I Love This City
May Erlewine (Earthworkmusic.com, BMI)
May Erlewine Bernard is, along with her creative and life partner Seth, a creative powerhouse. A manifester. She has a knack for writing songs that feel both timeless and completely focused on the current moment. This one is a love song to New Orleans that she wrote while watching the news reports of Hurricane Katrina. “You can see the colors, smell the chicory. You can feel the heart pounding out a beat.” It’s about true love, the kind that wants to see the beauty in everything, that would rather die than give it up. We love this song, and the groove it opened for us. It felt effortless to record, and felt twice as sweet when May added her harmonies. — AN
It was so damn hot, the air so thick
Even Sister Magnolia was wearing nothing but her slips.
Sittin’ on the corner waiting for his whites to dry
Spittin’ on his shoes, trying to get a little shine, he saysI love this city, love her all my life
I was born here and this is where I wanna die
If the hurricane comes, if the levees break
With my one true love I will wash awayYou could hear the music, pouring out into the streets
With a soul you’ll never know and a look you’ll never see
Walk the boulevard like she walk on air
With a struggle in her eyes and a flower in her hair, she saysI love this city, love her all my life
I was drawn here like water to the sky
If the hurricane comes, if the levees break
Then the heart of this nation will wash awayYou can see the colors, you can smell the chicory
You can feel the heart pounding out a beat
Over in the corner there’s an angel singin’ songs
To ease a troubled mind and help us carry onI love this city, I love her all my life
I was born here and this is where I wanna die
If the hurricane comes, if the levees break
With my one true love I will wash away - Piece of Land
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
Multiple stories twine into this song, but it begins with my having married a man who grew up on 100 wild acres and now lives on a paved city street. Life puts your dreams in the great big salad spinner with compromise. Separately and together, we leap (or don’t) for our visions — and then try to make peace with where we land, even as we keep imagining the future we want, and even as that vision keeps changing. I had in mind here all the women who climbed aboard Westward-bound wagons, headed for the wilderness of their husbands’ dreams. — RA
My man’s looking for a piece of land
Someplace high with a view
Where he can hold the earth in his hand
And see what his life has come to
See what his life has come to
Yodelay-hee, yodel-o
Yodelay-hee, yodel-oMy man’s looking for a piece of ground
Where nobody can find him
Where he don’t mind the whistling wind
With the quiet all inside him
The quiet all inside him
Yodelay-hee, yodel-o
Yodelay-hee, how do you hold a man
Who’s got his eye on a piece of land
His eye on a piece of land?My man’s looking for hallowed ground
With a clear pool of water
And a silver skin he can look upon
And set his mind to wander
Set his mind to wanderAs he sleeps I walk the wood
Mark myself the boundary
Gaze upon the solitude
That he cannot share with me
Lady be the spring that seeps
The silver pool, the river deep and wide
The water he can walk beside
And drink from when he’s dryMy man’s looking for a piece of land
He’s looking for a story
And here am I with a pen in my hand
And many years before me
Many years before me - Over and Over
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
In March of 2012, as we were releasing Some Bright Morning, I headed to Martha’s Vineyard for a songwriting retreat. I had three empty, quiet days — walking on empty beaches, collecting stones and shells, in cold wind and warm sun, treasuring solitude, thinking of home. Thinking of how I have to remember to pick up the beautiful things, pocket them, and treasure them, over and over. I can forget to do this. But then, a cardinal darted outside and opened my heart like a little red key, and I finished a love song. — RA
My love is a stone on the tideline
Pick him up, put him in my pocket, take him home
Over and overMy love is a shiny, glittering mother of pearl
He sparkles in the noonday
Over and overOne step back, two step go
It’s a needle in a haystack, don’t you know
My love is like the morning snow and a red bird flying
Over and over
This is how I find you, over and overMy love is a wave come a-rolling over the sea
He’s coming for me
Over and overMy love is a footprint I’m walking in, a soul
I am following home
Over and overOne step back and two-step go
It’s a needle in a haystack, don’t you know
My love is like the morning snow and a red bird flyingOne step back and two-step go
Needle in a haystack, don’t you know
My love is like the morning snow and a red bird flying
Over and over
This is how I find you, over and over - I’m Satisfied with you
Fred Rose (Sony/ATV Milene Music)
Fred Rose wrote this for Hank Williams. Scott and I, with a sideways grin, put it on our list of wedding songs. Neither of us wears satin, and I never got a diamond ring (hey, we’re musicians), and we both loved how this song paired wry realism with loving commitment and humor. This was a first take in the studio, unplanned. I love Anand’s electric guitar and the whole groove — simple and loose. Amen. — RA
You don’t dress up in satin
You don’t wear diamond rings
But I’m satisfied with you
You look just like an angel
But you haven’t got wings
And I’m satisfied with youI’d rather have you just the way that you are
Than change you for somebody new
Maybe I could do better if I reached for a star
But I’m satisfied with youYou’re not made out of candy
But you’re as sweet as you can be
And I’m satisfied with you
I just can’t see no reason why you bother with me
But I’m satisfied with youI often wonder if it’s all a mistake
It’s hard to believe that it’s true
But If I’m only dreaming then I don’t want to wake
‘Cause I’m satisfied with you - If I’m one
(Anand Nayak, Dizzydog Music, ASCAP)
The band was in Arkansas, doing a residency in Fayetteville, when we were offered tickets to see the Dalai Lama, along with activists Sister Helen Prejean and Vincent Harding, speak on the subject of non-violence. Each of them spoke simply and with great assuredness about their commitment to the idea of non-violence. The wholeness of their lives and their sense of self was palpable even from the nosebleed seats in the arena. I remember leaving the event and having the first line of the song come to me. Like a lot of the songs on this record, this one looks at love as balance. You can’t walk the line if you’re not willing to accept both sides of it and you can’t really accept something without loving it. Fortunately for us, there was no difficulty accepting Joe Walsh’s effortless mandolin playing into this song. — AN
There’s a time for giving what you’ve got — heaven knows there’s a need
But there’s a line between giving what you got and trying too hard to please
Sometimes I know where I am, sometimes I feel free
But there are times when that line goes right through meThere are ways of living in this world that lift a laboring heart
And there are ways of living in this world that tear the place apart
Sometimes I feel a smile begin, sometimes I let it be
But there are times when that line goes right through meIf I’m two, who will be one?
If I’m weak, who will be strong?
If I’m fake, who will be real?
If I’m numb, who will feel?There’s a place of forgiveness between the two of us
There’s a place of forgiveness and a place of deep distrust
Whether it’s your place or mine doesn’t matter much to me
If we can hold that line that’s the place I want to beAnd if I’m two, you’ll be my one
If you’re weak, I will be strong
If I’m fake, you can be real
If you’re numb, I will feel
And if I’m one, we can be two
If you miss, I will aim true
If I’m no, you’ll be my yes
If we fail we’ll put it in the past
We’ll put it in the past - Sweet and the Bitter
Rani Arbo (Jinn Mill Music, BMI)
Sometimes, a truth is not a fact, or a figure, or a precept, or a vision, but a feeling. And then, if you want to share it, you just have to try to translate it, in whatever inherently flawed way you can devise. I think that is what it means to be artist, a lover, a partner, a parent, a human being. — RA
Tell me about a good life
Like a tall drink of water sliding down a waterslide
Tell me how to be a good wife
Laundry on the line and the wind flyin’ through my dayTell me how to love my man
With his shining heart and crazy ways and his dirty hands
Tell me how to talk my heart
Through the scary part with loveBitter comes, bitter goes — a thorn above the rose
A song nobody knows to keep from singing
Bitter goes, bitter comes — sweet bread’s gone in a pile of crumbs
Give the crows their own for the takingTell me how to raise a child
Hands in his pockets and a little stone inside
Tell me how to keep him sweet and wild
And old devil time slowed downTell me how to say goodbye
To a mama and a daddy who held my head up high
Tell me about a good way to die
When it’s time, cause I don’t knowSweetness stay, sweetness gone — a rose above the thorn
Opening on a summer morning
Sweetness gone, sweetness stay — sweet bread baking on brand new day
Cover it up and keep it warmI don’t need to see forever
But I want to taste the sweet with the bitter
It’s the only way to keep it together
