Tin Can Trust
Shout! Factory
The Wolves are at the door, following up on 2006’s “The Town and the City” and 2009’s “Los Lobos Goes Disney” with a fresh set of original material birthed nearly entirely in the studio. For the first time in a long time, the roots rockers were all together in the same room — no demos made by members in their individual home studios as a starting point.
Cesar Rosas had a couple of songs already written, but the rest of this superb, self-produced effort was composed on the fly at Manny’s Estudio in the band’s old stomping ground of East Los Angeles. The final result: seven collaborations between guitarist/singer David Hidalgo and drummer Louie Perez; two Spanish-language numbers by guitarist/singer Rosas; one collaboration between Rosas and Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter (“All My Bridges Burning”); and a cover of the Dead’s “West L.A. Fadeaway.” The record’s predominant theme is survival in the current economic depression.
Susan Tedeschi provides guest harmony vocal on “I’ll Burn It Down,” one of two songs (the other being “Jupiter or the Moon”) on which bassist Conrad Lozano switches from electric to upright. On the jump-blues instrumental “Do the Murray” (whose title refers to Hidalgo’s recently deceased dog), the band charges full steam ahead in a back-and-forth guitar tour de force. The final cut on the disc, “27 Spanishes,” lyrically sums up the Spanish conquest of Mexico in four and a half minutes.
Other highlights include “On Main Street,” with its slow rhythm churning beneath a moderately fast electric guitar riff, culminating in a not-fair tease of a Steve Berlin sax solo; and the blues-folk-country ballad “The Lady and the Rose,” in which the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe is retold.
Also guesting are Cougar Estrada, touring with the band since 2002, on additional drums and percussion; and L.A. gospel keyboardist Rev. Charles Williams, on “All My Bridges Burning” and “Yo Canto.”
Tracks
1. Burn It Down
2. On Main Street
3. Yo Canto
4. Tin Can Trust
5. Jupiter Or The Moon
6. Do The Murray
7. All My Bridges Burning
8. West L.A. Fadeaway
9. The Lady And The Rose
10. Mujer Ingrata
11. 27 Spanishes
Total time: 47:23
External links
artist’s website
amazon.com
iTunes Store
