While the clouds overhead cried "mutiny"

I own the new Calexico long player and have been spinning it again and again. It is called Carried to Dust and is a rather gorgeous collection of songs. Critics have described this album as a ‘return to form’ for the Arizonan collective but I reckon – and I know that S agrees – that this is a tad unfair on their last effort, the understated and subtle Garden Ruin. But I can see what them critical types mean: Carried to Dust sees Calexico doing what they do best, conveying atmospheric subject matter with lush, expansive arrangements and exhilarating blasts of brass that stab joyously at the listener. The Calexico panorama is as it should be; these fellows evoke mystical Western skylines and sumptuous desert road trips with every note and syllable they proffer. Recommended heartily.