Mike Pinto The West is Still Wild Album Review
Mike Pinto The West Is Still Wild Review
Mike Pinto The West is Still Wild Album Review
It’s tough to go wrong with a song that starts out with some solid whistling, as did “The Cool And The Deadly.” The tune begins with some reggae strumming and then leads into a more spacey guitar sound. This particular track, as well as the rest of the album continually threw me for a loop, showing off the creativity and fearlessness of Mike Pinto and his band, in giving the listener something they wouldn’t expect.
This unpredictability appeared to be the theme for the album. For instance, “Feet Don’t Fail Me Now,” the first track, kicks things off with special guests DeLa from Slightly Stoopid on saxophone and Juan Rios from Seedless on keys. The song is broken up by smooth saxophone solos, and the tempo is changed up and transitions to the point that it feels like a new song entirely. Words roll off the tongue at times, reminiscent of Slightly Stoopid’s vocals, and become quicker and more harsh sounding at other times.
I honestly question whether or not Pinto has some schizophrenic qualities. However, I do not question his ability to take a string of seemingly random sounds and tie them together into one song with gliding transitions. It could be the fact that this is the first full album that the Mike Pinto Band has created together or maybe there is some truth to my schizophrenia theory. Whatever the case, the band makes the collage of sounds work.
The story of systematic chaos was the same from one song to the next. The second song, the title track, “The West Is Still Wild,” takes you into a completely different genre, still containing some characteristic rock/reggae feel but now throwing in a ska/punk sound. This track gives the listener a much more raw, gritty, and aggressive version of Pinto.
In his lyrics, he also demonstrates his aggressive side in “Everything I Got,” which is a new version from the title track of his 2009 solo album. Perhaps the words “Everything I got,” have more meaning to Pinto now, because they seem to explode from him with such conviction that it would be difficult not to believe him.
Although I was pleasantly surprised by the album as a whole, there were times that I was not on board. His love song, “Turn You On,” was a ringing example of this. The lyrics were far too simple, such as “I just wanna please you, that is why I wrote this song…” The song goes on and on without any clever methods of getting his words out there. With someone who has demonstrated a fair amount of creativity and versatility, it’s difficult to hear him get straight to the point and basically just say that he wants to have sex with someone. Throughout history, these words have been said many times and because of this, some originality is required to make it sound fresh.
That being said, the pros far out weigh the cons in this album. The Mike Pinto Band shows that they are not afraid to explore new boundaries in their music. They reach into a bag of tricks and give the audience a chaotic, flowing collection of music spanning various genres in the album, “The West Is Still Wild.” I recommend checking it out
Rating: 3 1/2 Stars