Calexico

The close of Calexico's Garden Ruin is so spirited and well-executed that it recasts the whole album in a different light. What comes before "Deep Down" and "All Systems Red" is an eight-song stretch of tunes that are solid but somewhat forgettable -- or, more charitably, simply don't outplay a crowded field. And -- better or worse, blessing or curse -- that's what is expected of Calexico at this point: not to stand in the middle of the road, but to be better than their peers and imitators.

To be fair, Garden Ruin is a transitional album, and may be paving the way for a future album that really blows the doors off the hinges, once the band has settled into their new groove. Billed as their "rock" album, Garden Ruin seems to be equal parts Americana-informed indie-pop and alt-country early on; it isn't until the fifth track, "Letter to Bowie Knife," that they finally race ahead with the rock. In case listeners are getting scared off by that point, they swiftly follow with "Roka," the most traditional song on the album, featuring a guest vocal from Amparo Sanchez that sounds perfectly and obviously at home in a Calexico song and yet, if detached from a back catalog, out of place on Garden Ruin. As much as anything, it's proof that the band has successfully gone off the old map.

But then things get really dicey, with a boring, jazzy song about finding a "Lucky Dime" and then "Smash," which takes a defeatist, sleepy pedal steel approach to a song that lyrically seems to be begging for more urgency or more vulnerability or more something.

If it ended there, Garden Ruin would be a promise of new, potentially good things to come from a band that could have just kept recycling their trusty old signature. But it would have been hard to recommend the album on its own merit. Fortunately, the closing trio of songs includes "Deep Down" and "All Systems Red," which finally rise up to match the intensity of the political and global concerns that rumble throughout the album. Both songs are lyrically incisive and, yes, bring the rock, too. While "Deep Down" is an electric guitar-led reprimand to those who have been bilked or blinded, "All Systems Red" is a fierier but ultimately more optimistic mini-epic with a wistful opening and a closing storm that wouldn't sound out of place coming from a noisy post-rock band like Mono. "I want to tear it all down and build it up again," Joey Burns shouts over the clamor. While he's talking about something much bigger than any band, that could also serve as a new mission statement for Calexico. - Adam McKibbin, The Red Alert

When a band starts out with an aesthetic as specific as Calexico's, sometimes expanding that sound means incorporating more pop elements into it. And, after years of being known -- accurately or not -- as the indie-mariachi band, Calexico may have felt boxed in by their very distinctiveness. Like Feast of Wire, Garden Ruin finds them moving further into more song-based, immediately accessible territory (their collaborations and performances with bands like Wilco and Iron & Wine may have also inspired them to tone down their theatricality). With no instrumentals -- a first on a Calexico album -- and less emphasis on elaborate arrangements, Garden Ruin presents an almost mainstream version of Calexico, with mixed results. At times, as on "Yours and Mine," the band strays toward typical alt-country and ends up sounding overly restrained and mature. However, the beautiful melodies on "Panic Open String" and "Bisbee Blue" (a warm little love song to Bisbee, AZ, where the album was recorded) and the '70s singer/songwriterisms of "Lucky Dime" prove that the band can bend pop to Calexico's sound instead of vice versa. Though Joey Burns' whispery vocals help make Garden Ruin feel initially more hushed than it actually is, it becomes clear as the album unfolds that Calexico haven't completely abandoned their flair for striking arrangements and drama. They've just channeled it in different directions. "Cruel" -- whose lyrics deal with environmental corruption -- nods to the classic Calexico sound with its swooning pedal steel, brass, and strings, while "Roka" is a haunted yet sexy-sounding duet that echoes the band's most stunning moments. "Letter to Bowie Knife" (which sounds like a kissing cousin to their fantastic cover of Love's "Alone Again Or?") marries lyrics like "This world's an ungodly place" to a buoyant melody, one of Calexico's time-tested tricks. Likewise, the gentlest, most intimate ballad is called "Smash" -- but even this relatively quiet song has thunderous timpani rolling in the distance. The band also rocks more than it has in the past, earnestly on "Deep Down" and with real anguish on Garden Ruin's striking final track, "All Systems Red." Ultimately, this album ends up being a more naturalistic take on Calexico's sound; just because it's less stylized doesn't mean it's less interesting -- it just takes a little more time for Garden Ruin's power to reveal itself. ~ Heather Phares, All Music Guide