Los Lobos – Good Morning Aztlan
It seems like just yesterday that Los Lobos soared out of East L.A. on a hot wind blast of Mexican-American roots music and punk-inspired DIY spirit. The fact that the lineup is the same as it’s been since the get-go — high school buddies Louie Perez, David Hidalgo, Conrad Lozano, and Cesar Rosas (plus Steve Berlin, who joined in 1983) — is all the more impressive.
Good Morning Aztlan is not one of the band’s most vital releases — it doesn’t belong, for instance, in the same league as the sonically challenging Kiko or the Mexican folk-roots exploration La Pistola Y El Corazon. But it is plenty familiar territory. As Perez notes in the press bio, “This record covers everything we’re about.”
Yet that’s just the issue: There’s too much going on here at once. The album’s songs and moods fling themselves around with almost random energy. One minute our heads are banging (the burning, churning kickoff track “Done Gone Blue”); the next we’re immersed in the slow and funky “Hearts Of Stone”, or battling back tears on the immigrant ballad “Tony & Maria”. It’s like the band is trying to show all its tricks at once.
Still, there’s lots to like here. The rock groove running through the title track is relentlessly catchy; “The Word” has the easy, breezy feel of ’70s summertime soul; the gentle, beautiful “What In The World” explores the fragility of love with tender, honest care; and the acoustic-based “Malaque” gives a nod to the band’s roots while at the same time toying with sounds, melodies, and sonic textures.
There’s an intriguing complexity in the arrangement of “Malaque”, yet a simple sense of musical curiosity, and love of a groovy rhythm, that make the song satisfying. It’s a prime example of why, after a quarter-century and counting, there’s still so much to love and respect about Los Lobos.