Calexico and Iron & Wine first made an artistic connection with In the Reins, the 2005 EP that brought Sam Beam, Joey Burns and John Convertino together. Beam, Burns and Convertino reconvened in Nashville for four days of recording in December 2018. Nobody was keen to retread old ground. "Life is hard. Awesome. And scary as shit. But it can lift you up if you let it," Sam offers. "These are the things Joey and I write about now. And the title can encapsulate a lot of things. Years to Burn could mean youre cocky, youve got it made. Or, our life is ours to burn, to be inspired. Or youre burned by life, brutalized. Its an ambiguous title, because life is complicated."