In the springtime of 2019, Mipso headed out on several writing retreats around their home state, with a mission of laying down the framework for their self-titled sixth album. In a particularly charmed outing for the North Carolina-bred four-piece—fiddle player Libby Rodenbough, mandolinist Jacob Sharp, guitarist Joseph Terrell, and bassist Wood Robinson—Mipso holed up on a farm near Chapel Hill in the middle of May, teasing songs out in a barn whose tin roof rattled wildly during the near-daily downpours. As with all their writing sessions for Mipso, the band brought in instruments outside their usual repertoire (analog synths, lap steel guitars, a toy piano), slipping into a prolonged period of…