Latin Playboys

a while back i was doing some record reviews for a local zine and i did a writeup on the first latin playboys...here it is, not sure how good it is but good enough for a mpls free fanzine

Latin Playboys – s/t
Label: Slash

If you grew up in the ‘80s, Los Lobos was one of those bands your “cool uncle” probably tried to hip you to. They were essentially a quasi-adventurous blues-rock band, distinguished by the fact that they were a bunch of hard-looking widebody Latinos from East L.A. instead of ponytailed white dudes. They were the type of band that got guest spots on Saturday Night Live and Late Night with David Letterman and four-star reviews in Rolling Stone for combining classic blues rock with some traditional Latin music moves. They weren’t bad either, but at the end of the day they just weren’t as different from mid-‘80s Eric Clapton albums as you wanted them to be, and are probably to blame for Los Lonely Boys.

The Latin Playboys were a side-project started by Lobos leader David Hildalgo and Louis Perez, along with then-au courant producers Mitchell Froom and Tchad Blake (Suzanne Vega, Tom Waits, Pearl Jam, etc). Under the direction of Froom and Blake, the pair conceived a self-titled debut album that’s still possessed of a vague, murky beauty.

People often use the word “cinematic” to describe music – I’ve used the term myself – and I’m never totally sure what they/I mean by it. Maybe it’s because certain albums evoke images in our head that approach a sort of waking dream; they seem to suggest more than is contained in the music. The Latin Playboys does just that, and I’m not sure if it’s because it’s great or because these guys are better at creating an atmosphere than they are at writing songs.

The best “songs” on the album could barely be called such, more brief sonic sketches like the opener “Viva La Raza”, which deploys junkyard percussion, “found sound” snippets of long-dead Mexican marching bands, and swirling Arabic strings to great effect. “Mira” conjures a barrio street fair with floating bits of conversation and deconstructed mariachi samples. In “Rudy’s Party,” dissonant dub bass notes and off-kilter drum machine claps disrupt what sounds like a field recording of an Appalachian fiddler. Honestly, about half the time this is like no other music you’ve ever heard.

If only they hadn’t felt it necessary to throw their usual audience of a few life preservers of boring rectangle rock (i.e. “real songs” that sound like Los Lobos with more reverb), this might have been perfect. As it stands, it’s pretty damn close.

what! a majority of the songs are super accessible, and the dude has a real "pretty" voice! were these albums really popular when they came out? xp

Your review is pretty spot on and I like how it's written. I'm a big sucker for atmospheric shit that doesn't really resolve, but I lol still like the boring rectangular rock songs, even the one on the s/t that sounds like a pop-punk 90s alt rock radio hit

I like the one about going to the drive-in in their dad's pickup truck

I always figured that Latin Playboys was the logical result of David Hidalgo playing on Tom Waits' Bone Machine two years earlier.

Just heard the debut and, yeah, this is exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for these days. Take the basic rock'n'roll format but stretch it, add a dash of other genres, process it, and generally fuck it up but not quite beyond recognition. Atmospheric is right, there's this sort of out-of-time feeling to the songs and I love the percussion loops. Giving the second LP a listen now on Spotify.

Am I the only one who bough the RSD vinyl reissue of the s/t album?

This band still sounds great to me. Hope they reissue Dose next.

I wish I loved "Dose" as much as the debut, but it's just missing something, or not as consistent, can't put my finger on it.

The s/t is better, I agree, but I'd buy a reissue of the second one anyway. Are there any current bands doing this sort of avant / stoner blues stuff? I described this album to someone who'd never heard it as "a lot like a good Tom Waits album without Tom Waits." That doesn't totally cover the breadth of what this band does, of course, but it's a good start, I think.

love the album, didn't buy the vinyl was wondering if it was just a CD rip? (didn't look to have much about the process)
how does it sound?

also, that seems like one of those RSD releases that's gonna be in stores forever

The self titled is better, but Dose has Mustard, my alltime fave. That could be a hit.

love the album, didn't buy the vinyl was wondering if it was just a CD rip? (didn't look to have much about the process)
how does it sound?

also, that seems like one of those RSD releases that's gonna be in stores forever

― The Desus & Mero Chain (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, April 26, 2018 3:14 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It sounds fine, but could very well be a CD rip. If you're looking for "it's like hearing the album again for the first time" levels of remastering or something, this definitely ain't it, at least not to these ears. But the pressing itself is solid: no noise, nice and loud. You probably don't need it if you have it on CD or digital.

And I too thought it would be one of those ubiquitous-forever-and-eventually-marked-down RSD titles but I went to three stores and only one had it, and only two copies. Of course, that could just mean stores weren't ordering it.

Where did I see this described as a sort of East L.A. "Another Green World?" Because it sort of is.

Thanks for reminding me of these guys. I liked the first lp alright but the song I truly loved was "Mr. Wobble" off the 'End of Violence' soundtrack.

Where did I see this described as a sort of East L.A. "Another Green World?" Because it sort of is.

Not quite - even at it's strangest, Latin Playboys sounds earthier and more familiar - but a great album nonetheless. I like Los Lobos' Kiko even more, but in a lot of ways, I prefer Latin Playboys over everything else they've done by a good margin. I don't know why everything works so well here and on Kiko - Froom's production can seem too mannered and self-conscious elsewhere.

*its

I like it , but not sure about that Eno comparison

In the sense that there are lots of different moods and fragments, I guess.

had never given the s/t a spin, file under what was the last 'classic album' you got and were knocked out by?