El Bueno y el Malo

by Hermanos Gutierrez

Overview

The title of the fifth long-player from these Swiss-Ecuadorian brothers translates as "the good and the bad." There is no ugly, though the inspiration Hermanos Gutiérrez drew from Ennio Morricone's theme to Sergio Leone's epic spaghetti Western is obvious. This date follows 2020's widely acclaimed Hijos de Sol. Recorded in Nashville at producer Dan Auerbach's Easy Eye Sound studio, it appears on his label. For the uninitiated, the Gutiérrez siblings' music embodies musical and production elements that recall Ry Cooder's soundtracks (especially Paris, Texas) and the Western scores of Nico Fidenco, Alessandro Alessandroni, Luis Bacalov, and Morricone, as well as vintage Latin American music from the 1950s and '60s. The brothers' sound reflects endless, sun-drenched skies and remote, often unforgiving, spooky landscapes. Estevan and Alejandro play a traditional electric guitar and a lap steel guitar with organic percussion. Their intimate approach involves one brother establishing a rhythmic vamp while the other entwines his melodic lines around it inextricably. For the first time, they are selectively accompanied by chamber strings, congas, and on "Tres Hermanos," Auerbach's guitar. The desert-flavored title track opens the album. It was recorded surreptitiously 20 minutes after the duo's arrival in the studio for the session. While the brothers were working out the changes amid the reverbed, string-bending lyricism, Auerbach hit "record," capturing their idiosyncratic, seamless sonic dialogue. They kept the take. "Los Chicos Tristes" emerges sounding like a Latinized version of something from early Durutti Column. The fingerpicked chord voicings and interwoven middle and bass string fills are adorned by wispy yet insistent strings, creating a quiet, foreboding sense of drama. "Thunderbird" draws on the song forms of Mexican nueva canción and Cuban bolero. The guitar interplay is knotty yet limpid; their playing is nearly telepathic in its slippery melody and circular interaction. "Tres Hermanos" -- with Auerbach on a third guitar -- happened because the producer helped the pair work out a particularly difficult arrangement. Two serpentine guitars create a harmonic labyrinth and a rhythm that recalls the rural Mexican cumbia. Lead fills waft in and out until the lap steel enters, creating alternate lyric lines, ringing harmonies, and pulse-like phrasing above simple percussion. While "Pueblo Man" is a gorgeous pastoral ballad, "La Verdad" weds cumbia, surf, blues, and Mexican vaquero (cowboy) music. "Los Amantes" whispers its drifting serpentine melody across a percussive, fingerpicked lower-string vamp. Percussion paces the pair, who weave in and through one another as the lap steel whines in the distance. Closer "Dorado Valley" employs a minor key. A two-chord rhythm vamp is established, altering the soundscape with shapes and overdubbed fingerpicking; the lap steel flows above, around, and through with intimate and intricate lines. It carries the set out with a lonesome, arid groove. Due to wider distribution this time, the gorgeous El Bueno y El Malo will present a greater opportunity for listeners to encounter the nomadic, atmospheric sound world of Hermanos Gutiérrez. Don't miss it. ~ Thom Jurek

Product Details

Release Date:	10/28/2022
Label:	Easy Eye Sound
UPC:	0888072453777

Tracks

1. El Bueno Y El Malo
2. Hermosa Drive
3. Los Chicos Tristes
4. Thunderbird
5. Cielo Grande
6. Tres Hermanos
7. Pueblo Man
8. La Verdad
9. Los Amantes
10. Dorado Valley

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Hermanos Gutierrez   Primary Artist
Dan Auerbach   Primary Artist,Guitar (Electric)
Matt Combs   Strings
Mike Rojas   Piano,Fender Rhodes,Guitar (Bass)
Sam Bacco   Congas,Shaker,Maracas,Timbales,Triangle,Castanets,Tambourine
Alejandro Gutierrez   Guitar,Guitar (Electric),Guitar,Guitar (Electric)
Jay Mumford   Drums
Estevan Gutierrez   Bells,Bongos,Guitar,Guitar (Bass),Guitar (Electric)

Technical Credits

Ryan Smith   Mastering,Mastering Engineer
McKinley James   Assistant Engineer
Jim Herrington   Photography
Perry Shall   Design
M. Allen Parker   Mixing,Engineer,Recording
Caleb VanBuskirk   Engineer
Tyler Zwiep   Assistant Engineer
Daniel Alejandro Hotz   Composer
Stephan Ricardo Hotz   Composer
Dan Auerbach   Mixing,Producer,Recording Producer
John Ullman   Assistant Engineer