Calexico: Somehow More Country Than Jessica Simpson

Dan Gibson | September 9, 2008 2:30 am
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From time to time, we like to round up the all-important, all-summarizing last sentences of the biggest new-music reviews. After the jump, we look at other publications’ reactions to the new album from the pride and joy of Tucson: Calexico.

• “However, their music can sound both wonderfully evocative or occasionally faux–as authentic as a Mexican restaurant located in Milton Keynes–and lacks a dominant vocal like former bandmate Howe Gelb, of Giant Sand.” [The Guardian]

• “Burns and Convertino have been working together for 18 years now, playing on recordings by Nancy Sinatra, Neko Case and Evan Dando, collaborating with Iron & Wine on a split EP in 2005 and serving as the house band on the soundtrack to last year’s oddball Bob Dylan movie, I’m Not There. And they’re good at it. Their own recordings, though, are where the pair truly shines and Carried to Dust is the best example yet.” [Hartford Courant]

• “It’s tempting to think of Carried To Dust as a companion piece to Feast Of Wire. It has the same stylistic diversity, with a hefty dose of pan-Latin zest. And, like that distinguished predecessor, this one is a beauty from start to finish.” [Paste]

• “Amparo Sanchez, Pieta Brown, and Iron & Wine’s Sam Beam guest, but it’s Calexico’s two core members, Joey Burns and John Convertino, who continue to impress as a Southwestern Wrecking Crew–Convertino with his fluttering snare play and anxious rim shots and Burns with his partiality to nylon-stringed guitars and his secretive vocal delivery.” [Boston Phoenix]