Big Backyard

There's a generosity of spirit in "Big Backyard" that distinguishes it from standard pastoral fare — a song about outdoor space and natural landscape that holds something more than scenic appreciation. Tuttle brings to the subject the perspective of a Californian who grew up with the American West as her backyard in a literal and psychological sense, the mountains and coast and valleys forming her internal geography as much as her actual one. The production has an open-air quality, the acoustic instruments allowed natural resonance, the arrangement spacious rather than crowded. Her flatpicking guitar establishes the song's physical groundedness from the opening — the technique here feels like good physical exertion, purposeful and clean. Lyrically the song inhabits the idea of vast natural space as both fact and right: the commons, the wilderness, the shared land that belongs to no one and therefore everyone. There's a democratic insistence in the title that connects to the tradition of folk music as community property — the big backyard as a space that should be available to everyone who needs the particular restoration that comes from standing somewhere that was here before you and will be here after. Warm and inviting, suited for actual outdoor listening, the kind of song that sounds best with the windows down.