Jesse Kivel is a Maine-based musician and “The House of Nassi” is his first single released since 2023. “The House of Nassi” has that sweet country twang while also having a sweet story behind it. Kivel reminisces on a family friend’s birthday invitation when he was a kid. This family friend, Al Nassi, sent a cassette tape that contained a recording of them singing a song, inviting the recipient to his fortieth birthday. Now forty himself, Kivel reflects on how this goofy, over-the-top song has somehow stayed in his mind for 30 years, and how his current age once seemed “so old” to his young eyes.
The song is primarily about the sobering realizations of life’s brevity as you age and how much of it you can actually remember. It is also about seeking paradise and understanding when paradise is lost, a theme that most likely comes from Kivel’s relocation from Los Angeles to Maine. Reflecting on the infamous birthday invitation tape gave Kivel the epiphany that technology has altered our memories and how we view the world. Maybe even how we relate to each other. Technology has made something like sending a birthday invitation ten times easier, but what we lose are these very intimate moments between people, even in something as trivial as a birthday invitation.
Leave a Reply