Calexico – Carried to Dust
Before you go out expecting anything from this album let me warn you: I am a massive Calexico fan and when I first heard it, I hated it. Where are the tunes, I thought; where is the spirit, the playfullness? I just heard a musical morass from which very little stood out. If you are a first time Calexico listener, therefore, I would say DO NOT start with this, start with Feast of Wire or Hot Rail. If you are a fan, like myself, then you are probably much more likely to give this the time it needs to sink in, in which case proceed.
Basically, I will admit that this is still far from my favourite Calexico album, although I think that with the exception of the mind-blowing Roka, I may prefer it to Garden Ruin. Spoke is a possibility too, but they’re all such different albums it’s a bit stupid to be making these sorts of comparisons. Although it’s not my favourite album of all time, there are a hell of a lot of things on this record which I love.
As with many albums which have taken me a while to get into, I thought I didn’t like it and then started looking for the good songs. At this point I realised that the list was surprisingly long: Victor Jara’s Hands, Two Silver Trees, Truth About William, Inspiracion, House of Valparaiso, Slown… hang on, I’m only just over half way through the record here.
The inspired noodling and two-minute instrumentals which add such character to their early stuff is still absent, and we are still faced by the neat, regular, three to four minute pop sings of Garden Ruin. The arrangements and personality of the songs themselves, however, hark back to earlier times. It’s a more local sound once more, moving back to the deserts of Southern Arizona and away from the more powerful, rockier sound with which they recently dallied. There’s more mariachi welcomed back into the mix as well, albeit delivered with less gravel this time around.
Maybe the fact that it’s thirteen songs long masks the fact that there is at least an album’s worth of great songs in this collection. There are, unfortunately, a few inbetween that I really haven’t come to really like all that much, so in my opinion it could easily have been ten songs long, and would have been tighter for it. Then again, they and I probably wouldn’t have picked the same ten songs, so maybe I just have to accept that this is an album I only half love, and appreciate it for that without all the second-guessing.
Be warned though, it does take some time to get into.
Calexico – The News About William
Calexico – Inspiracion
Website | More mp3s | Buy from Touch & Go/Quarterstick Records
I shall reserve judgement til I’ve bought and listened to it later today!
Yes, you can come and tell me I’m a twat after that.
This does nothing to save Calexico in my opinion.
It’s a simple case of over-egging the pudding. It’s all just too polished.
The News About William is a nice song, but for a start there’s no need for all those strings. It adds nothing.
And Inspiracion is fucking dinner party music at best.
can i say that I have no piror experience of calexico but if I listened to News About William first I may be tempted to investigate more. If I listened to Inspiracion first I would be unlikely to want to check out more.
bart you must have some weird dinner parties.
Ah but with so much other fantastic Latin music out there, why Calexico? Over produced, yes… it sort of reminds me of that type of furniture that is all the rage here now, “distressed”, it’s new but with markings all over it to make it appear “antique” or “vintage”. Why go to all that effort to create a sound that has already been made in the 50s and 60s and done, dare I say, better? Oh strike me dead now, I’ll never get any free music! But, hey, Matty, if it turns you on, be proud, play it loud! Music is a personal affair xoxoxo
Any more comments that call me Matty are getting deleted.
I’m with Euan.
I kinda like the first one, and I’d listen further.
The second one is pointless parody. Unless you’re going to bring me some fajitas and a pitcher of margaritas while I’m listening to it, I’m just not interested, thanks.
It’s not a pointless parody any more than King Creosote is a pointless parody of Scottish folk for fuck’s sake. They are actually from fucking Arizona, it’s not like they’ve just seen a few fucking Taco Bell adverts and thought ‘Huh, that looks cool’.
Well that’s what it sounds like!
I could really go with a margarita and some Mexican food now, though.
oops, so sorry, MATTHEW, would it have gone over better if I’d not been insulting one of your favorite bands? Won’t happen again, I swear xx
You could have been offering me a blowjob and Matty would still have been shit.
arizona – that’s in mexico right?!
Judging by that song it’s in Pancho Villa’s restaurant on the Royal Mile.
Right-O, well Matthew it is, from now on. The blowjob will have to be negotiated over drinks with the Mrs.
As for Calexico, it really is unfair of us all to judge them by two songs. For a band with 10 + albums out, a long and productive career, and loads of fans surely they deserve more time and attention. And yet here we are mocking their two measly songs so graciously given up as a gift by our lovely host! Shame on us!
Good God, such bile just because they travel with a Mariachi band. Let’s be a little careful about mocking folk influences in modern folk-rock shall we Scotland. Bagpipes. Bagpipes for Christssake!
By the way, if you need a lesson on the location of Arizona check the current job description of Moral Weeble and Racsit Old Person poster child John McCain.
They don’t travel with a mariachi band. The last time I saw them they had a trumpeter who occasionally played guitar and a bloke who played anything from guitar to keyboards to trumpet, so they could switch pretty easily from very mariachi sounding to some of the more guitary numbers from Garden Ruin. They were fucking brilliant too, if anyone’s asking.
[...] couple of albums. Well, I’ve already confessed to being in two minds about the last one, as I said in my review. It is, as people said in the comments, a little too shiny. The production is excessively slick, [...]
“Carried to Dust” is my first exposure to Calexico. Downloaded it on a whim.
I was hooked immediately. I find it to be dense, dramatic, wistful, mystical, and uplifting. When I heard “El Gatillo (Trigger Revisited),” I thought I was listening to Friends of Dean Martinez, so I jumped online to learn more. Now, after a month, I still listen to it once a day.
I look forward to digging into their back catalog, and I’m excited about their Nov. 20th show in the Detroit area.
My $0.02. And thanks.
– Eric
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