Becca Mancari Left Hand (Milky Clear)

Since moving to Nashville to start their music career in 2012, Becca Mancari has been lauded fortheir dextrous songwriting and prodigious guitar playing. Their sophomore album The GreatestPart, released in 2020, was an indie rock opus that garnered acclaim from The New York Times,NPR, and more. After it's release, however, Mancari was despairing. An illness in their family,coupled with a realization that their alcohol dependency had become untenable, led Mancari tobegin the hard work of taking ownership of their existence by mending broken relationships andinvesting in their mental health. "I didn't realize it then, but looking back, I was a passenger inmy own life," Mancari says. The transformative period of self-reckoning was the catalyst thatultimately steered Mancari to write and produce their triumphant new album, Left Hand.While Left Hand came out of a dark period in Mancari's life, the album is anything but. Wide-open and welcoming, the music beckons all listeners, encouraging community among strangers.On the album, Mancari asserts a radical self-acceptance. The propulsive track "It's Too Late"binds this new album to the hypnotic rhythms of The Greatest Part, and while the lyricschronicle personal tragedy ("I almost drove off the road that night/ Did you know I almost did itso many times?") the bass-driven groove is undeniable, luring us deeper into the album. The boldadmission is but one example of the intimacy experienced throughout the record, suggesting thatmusic, too, has been a part of their growth and healing expedition.Initially, Mancari planned to hire a producer on their third LP, just as they had done on earlierrecords, but a disheartening studio session convinced them they were capable of rendering theirvision independently. Close friend and musical ally Juan Solorzano, who has played on all ofMancari's albums since the debut of Good Woman in 2017, joined them in the studio to co-produce the majority of the record. In addition, Daniel Tashian (Kacey Musgraves, DemiLovato) co-wrote and co-produced the song "Don't Close Your Eyes," encouraging Mancari totrack every instrument on the initial demos, and while they had never considered themself amulti-instrumentalist, Mancari took seat on the drum throne working out the skitteringpercussion of the tune until it hit just right. As much as self-producing this album was an act ofresilience and growth in one's own craft, Mancari brought trusted friends like Brittany Howard,who they play with in Bermuda Triangle, Julien Baker and Zac Farro into the process."Producing this record was life-giving. It was scary, at first, to be trusted with this role, but Iknew I'd only gain more agency and strength over my career through the process," Mancari says.Insecurities that had dogged Mancari since childhood couldn't weather the force of energy in thatstudio, where they executed decisions with newfound certainty. The title track, "Left Hand," isnamed for the Mancari family crest from the Italian region of Calabria in which a left hand holdsa dagger aloft. After a lifetime spent feeling like they didn't belong, Mancari unlocked a perfectmetaphor in the crest: "In many cultures children born with a dominant left hand were taught notto use that hand, and were told that using the right hand was 'normal' and 'correct.' Similarly,queer children are often times told that it's not 'normal' for them to love who they love and thatthey need to 'change.'"Though Mancari has experienced that alienation, "Homesick Honeybee" is a tender ode to theirgrandfather, whose voicemail opens the track and who was the first member of their family towholly accept Mancari's queerness. "When a bee loses it's way, it can't survive without a hive."Mancari ponders, "It physically dies without it's community." But fortunately, their grandfatherwas always a supportive and reliable presence. You can hear the confidence and assurednessbuilding in Mancari's voice as they intone the opening verses over a bed of warm indie synths,and when the chorus hits, any sense of lostness explored in the lyrics is drowned out by thecertainty of this confrontation: "How you gonna break my broken heart/ That's already put backinto so many pieces/ I can't even feel it."Ecological processes rely on interdependency and Mancari uses the natural world to emphasizetheir own reliance on other humans, and on the life-giving Earth itself. On the album's strikingcloser, "To Love the Earth," Mancari sings of a new commitment to an undefined spirituality."Wanna crown you in Queen Anne's Lace/ Wanna be rebaptized but in a different kind of way,"they sing. The song sounds like a rainy morning when there is no place to be but home and theslight pitter-patter against the windows brings comfort. Fingerpicked guitars and subtlepercussion are overtaken on the chorus, which swells to a point of catharsis as Mancarisurrenders: "Wanna love you forever, wanna love you forever." The "you" is unspecified,applicable to a partner, to a community, to family, to the Earth that cradles us all. "To Love theEarth" leaves us with an overwhelming sense of peace, a feeling so rarely accessed outside ofmusic.Left Hand is generous in this way; Mancari offers the listener a collection of songs that should beplayed in moments when we are in need of reassurance and encouragement. No song exemplifiesthis better than the ebullient track "Over and Over," which is a reminder to friends that happinessdoesn't need to be fleeting. "I wanted to write a queer pop song that has meat on it's bones," theysay. Inspired by one of many reckless and joyful hangs with dear friends in Nashville, theenlivening pop song makes a promise to them, and to the greater community Mancari embraceson this album. "There is something to the feeling/ Head hanging out of the window/ Being okthat we don't know," sung on the chorus over a beat replete with congas and shakers. Whatfollows is a promise to anyone who ever feels like the greatest moments of their life aredisappearing in the rearview: "We can have it like we used to, over and over and over and overagain."