Poverty and unwanted pregnancy (the title track’s theme) are just as likely to make an appearance in their songs as lost love and homesickness. Unlike so many other bluegrass traditionalists, Jim Krewson and Jennie Benford write their own songs, and they hit hard: these folks are throwbacks to a harsh, bucolic era, which they hardly romanticize. Jim & Jennie & the Pinetops – One More in the Cabinīy the time this Brooklyn/Pennsylvania bluegrass band (formerly the Pine Barons) put out this album, their third, in 2002, they’d honed their period-perfect oldtime sound to a high lonesome wail, in the process helping to jumpstart an already nascent New York country music scene. Anybody feel like shoveling? In the meantime, as we do every day, our 1000 best albums of all time countdown continues as it does every day, all the way to #1. Here we are back in Babylon, where the mayor only wants the streets free of snow in the white neighborhoods: and guess where we are. Although way, way smarter than U2 and trippier than Midnight Oil, fans of those bands will probably enjoy this. The high point is the lushly gorgeous Fin (The End) there’s also the funky, atmospherically trip-hop tune Parapadea the hypnotic piano-driven Deterrite (Melt), the blazing 2/4 stomper Tu Reino (Your Kingdom) and the symphonic sweep of No Me Culpes (Don’t Blame Me). The studio album sounds like the Church with a string section. The live stuff swirls, stalks and roars, all the way through the pensive, hypnotic Las Ratas No Tienen Alas (slang for “And pigs can fly”), De Noche Todos los Gatos son Pardos ((At Night All Cats Are Grey) and the harsh Amarrate a una Escoba y Vuela Lejos (Get on a Broom and Fly Away), the riff-rocking Quisiera Ser Alcohol (I’d Like to Be Alcohol) and the big singalong hits Dime Jaguar (Tell Me Jaguar) and No Dejes Que (Don’t Let…). This double album from 2000 – one disc recorded live, one in the studio – captures both sides of his songwriting. It was a trajectory that Caifanes had followed steadily, shifting from trebly, Cure-inspired pop-rock anthems to a darker, slower, hallucinatory vibe. Jaguares is what Caifanes – the most popular Mexican rock band of the 80s and 90s – became when frontman/guitarist Saul Hernandez wanted to go in an artsier direction. Every day our 1000 best albums of all time countdown continues, all the way to #1.
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March 2023
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