Calexico's new album, Garden Ruin, is change of direction for the band. On this, their seventh album, the Southwestern rockers have finally lost their distinctive mariachi twang. Like Modest Mouse, Death Cab for Cutie and My Morning Jacket before them, they have distilled their sound in a bid for mainstream success. But unlike the aforementioned groups, they have not replaced their South-of-the-border sound with anything especially novel. The album just sounds kind of bland—like the exceedingly polite offspring of Yo La Tengo and a down-and-out Ryan Adams.
The album is not all terrible. Its bookends, opener Cruel\ and closer ""All Systems Red,"" are gently propulsive, satisfying tracks. ""All Systems Red"" is, in fact, great. Lead singer Joey Burns sings of upcoming storms and dread flowing in his veins as a cyclone of electric guitars slowly builds around him. By the track's end, he screams of wanting to ""tear it all down and build it up again"" over a squall of guitars. It is a thrilling finale. It would be even better if the rest of the album was built like it.
Calexico have clearly taken a few cues from last fall's successful collaboration with folk singer Sam Beam, AKA Iron & Wine. They emulate Beam's minimalist folk on much of the album. However, they achieve an awkward middle ground: not intimate enough to achieve the spooky Southern Gothic vibe of Beam's work, and too tuneless and aimless to make an impression in the mainstream.
Ironically, one of the album's strongest and most alluring tracks, ""Roka,"" takes a page from Calexico's back catalogue. Like their previous work, it builds off a sultry Salsa arrangement. Calexico adds some subtle horns and female guest singer Amparo Sanchez, and conjures a stifling Southern night. Burns sings ""Close your eyes, slow your breath"" in a hushed whisper, and Sanchez answers him with ""Gira, vuelta y vuelta gira."" Imagine Shakira's ""Hips Don't Lie"" done with some actual heat and you get the idea.
Calexico would do well to build from this song or either of the album's bookends. For a better representation of the genre, pick up their excellent, atmospheric collaboration with Iron & Wine or the similar but superior desert folk of Collisions from the similarly named Calla.
\
