NEWS / Sep 28, 2006

I got this CD a few months ago, and was astounded by how vital and
fresh and deep it was. Hadnt Los Lobos turned into a boring jamband
about 10 years ago? So this summer was largely a re-examination of
this band, which I once loved more than maybe I should have. After
all, How Will the Wolf Survive? was prime lets get drunk music in
college, my wife and I fell in love to the La Bamba soundtrack, and
Ive been known to crank up our graphics departments copy of Kiko at
work to get a project done. But what have I been missing by ignoring
them since then?

Well, Im ashamed to say that the answer is: a whole hell of a lot.
It turns out, after my research into all their studio albums and box
sets (man, I love the library system), that Los Lobos never fell off
at all. The warm, rugged beauty in David Hidalgos voice kept on
delivering even after I stopped paying attention, and Louie Perez
lyrics on albums like Colossal Head and Good Morning Aztlan remained
folk poetry of the highest order. The box set called El Cancionero:
Mas y Mas has largely taken over my iPod, and I can even recommend
2004s The Ride, which celebrated their 30-year anniversary as a
working band.

But forget all that history jazz for right now; lets get back to the
record that sent me on my mission. The Town and the City is just as
tight and adventurous as anything else coming out this year, a lean
and hungry record full of beauty and pain and fear and hope by five
guys who know what the hell theyre talking about.

It starts out in atmospheric/psychedelic mode with The Valley, a
song full of swirling guitar sounds and a disorientingly circular
structure in both its music and its words. We go from the founding of
Los Lobos beloved Los Angeles (“They seemed pleased with what they
had found”) to the present-day struggles of its people to keep bread
on the table with no warning whatsoever. It is an epic beginning for
what turns out to be an epic album.

Because a few songs after we visit The Valley, we run right up
against The City. This is a grinding rock song full of unexpected
bursts of be-bop chords built up over a beefy mambo beat, and it will
take a lot longer than a summer for me to fully understand how it
works. The talk is all about going out and celebrating, but in a
threatening (and threatened) way: Come on lets go out tonight /
Shoot out all the neon lights. The freaky ambient noises and lengthy
guitar explorations make this a pretty unreliable signpost on our
journey.

In the meantime, we have come through a lot of different places and
styles and moods. The Road to Gila Bend is a standout, a
straightforward-seeming song with a revved-up guitar sound and a huge
pop drumbeat with spooky lyrics about staying ahead of the law with
four silver dollars and a mortal need to get to Tucson by the morning
light. We never actually learn why this character is fleeing, but the
disconnect between the words and the music is hauntingand the solo
is cool as hell. Little Things sounds like the Band covering A
Whiter Shade of Pale, but one chord change at the end of the first
verse deepens it immensely.

Some of the blues stuff here is shockingly effective. Hold On rides
Tchad Blakes mix into surreal territory, an appropriate place about
a protagonist working himself into an early grave: Killing myself
just to stay alive / Killing myself to survive. Two Dogs and a
Bone, on the other hand, uses charm and guile to turn a childhood
memory into a universal statement about, um, sharing.

But Los Lobos retain their ability to kick any Latin genre they
choose. Chucos Cumbia is tough and lovely, giving Steve Berlin the
opportunity to blast a twisty-turny baritone sax solo. No Puedo Mas
takes cumbia even further into dub territory, while Luna reaches
further back into Mexican musics folk past. But even these tunes are
darker and edgier than the band has seemed on their last couple of
records.

Everything comes back home on the final track, The Town. On its
surface, it is a simple song about the lifelong effects of growing up
in poverty; these effects are both negative (poverty) and positive
(family cohesion, cultural identity). It combines rock and folk and
Latin music, and its hushed tones are both lullaby and warning. Like
The Valley and The City, this song uses a sharp guitar tone and
some out-there sonics to make itself bigger than it is, but it is
already huge. In fact, The Town may be huge enough to be the
definitive statement on what may be the definitive album of one of
the most overlooked bands of our time.

RATING: 9 on a scale of 10
28 September 2006

Matt Cibula of popmatters.com gives T&C 9 out of 10 stars