The Iguanas Are Themselves in Juarez
They've been known as a Tex-Mex band, but The Iguanas show on their new album that they're more without sacrificing anything.
I can’t remember when The Iguanas sounded as free as they do on their new album, Juarez. On Saturday night, they’ll play a CD-release show at the Rock 'n' Bowl for the album, and on it, they seem largely uninterested in what others think, so the songs come from a fairly pure place. That doesn’t mean it’s difficult or even unusual. Rod Hodges remains a stellar songwriter, and the album-closing “When the Weather Breaks” is the sort of lonely, beautiful, Jimmy Webb-like song that he makes seem effortless, though the dearth of such songs in the world says they’re harder than they sound. The band’s musical instincts lean toward rock ’n’ roll and popular music, but inside that wide framework, they claim a lot of freedom this time around.
Rene Coman’s “Wedding of Chicken and Snake,” for example, hits a cool Tex-Mex groove and is essentially an instrumental with Spanish speech coming through a CB (or something like it) laid on top, almost like a found vocal. “Love, Sucker” is a “Soulfinger”-like, horn-driven instrumental with the title phrase sung on occasion. The noir “‘Blues for Juarez” with its sustained guitar notes on the edge of feeding back sets a beautiful, dangerous, faintly romantic mood with a spoken Spanish vocal by Hodges. None of this is difficult, but nothing here reflects even the flicker of interest in another “Oye Isobel” unless that’s the direction someone’s muse leads him.
That doesn’t mean The Iguanas have given up dance tracks. “Soul Kiss” is a fuzzy garage rocker, “Make That Magic Happen” is a swamp pop song made for the dance floor, and Joe Cabral’s “Dame Tu Reloj” has an infectious, physical slink thanks to Rene Coman’s bass, which leaves space so that each phrase he plays is really felt.
Because of that freedom, Juarez gives a clue as to what matters to the band. The breadth of musical influences that they combine in their songs is clearly important, and they know that they’re more than just a dance band. It’s an important part of who they are, but it’s not the end of their ambition. Juarez also shows that they’ve got the chops to back up their ambition.
