Raul Malo: Carry On

Raul Malo has been swimming against the currents of Nashville ever since he arrived in town a decade-and-a-half ago with his Latin-tinged country-rock band, the Mavericks. And his latest solo album, Lucky One, drives that point home anew.

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The trend currently dominating major label country—a designation Malo once shared, though he’s now signed to California-based indie Fantasy and his recent output has been as much Latin-, jazz- and pop-inflected as country—is to model itself after 1980s-era soft rock. Malo skipped that decade altogether when he wrote and recorded his new batch of songs, and drew inspiration from late ‘50s and early ‘60s pop, r&b, rockabilly and rock and roll instead.

“I think I certainly borrow from the past,” he offers. “But I think you kind of have to borrow from the past to look to the future. It’s a weird thing. I mean, I hear so many records that emulate some of the worst music I’ve ever heard in my life. If I’m going to borrow from something, I go further back. But then you also want to put your own spin on things and not be too retro, because I think that that’s boring too.”

Malo’s not just paying lip service there. On his new album, he blends vintage rock and roll’s simple, energetic pleasures—buoyant melodies and plenty of bopping and shuffling—with peppery Latin grooves and dramatic vocal performances.

Lucky One boasts another glaring point of divergence from contemporary country. Most acts hire a guitarist to fill every nook and cranny with busy licks, but Malo—not previously known for his guitar work—did the job himself. The result is a lot of lean, tasteful single-string work. Malo even has a low-string Duane Eddy moment during “Lonely Hearts.”

“Basically, I’m covering up for my lack of talent by playing all those low notes,” he jokes. “I know where my bread and butter is—it’s not in my guitar playing. People don’t come out to the shows to hear me play guitar.”

“Honestly, [producer] Steve Berlin was instrumental in this,” Malo continues. “When he heard the demos, he asked me, ‘Man, who’s playing on these demos?’ And I said, ‘Well, basically it’s me.’ And he just said, ‘We don’t really need to hire a guitar player.’ I was like, ‘Well, okay. I mean, if you really think these guitar parts work.’ I’m not one of those blazing guitar player guys, but I can come up with guitar parts. And sometimes that’s just good enough. And sometimes that’s even better. Finally I have a record that has, like, air.”

Before Lucky One, Malo essentially recorded four straight albums of cover material—The Nashville Acoustic Sessions, You’re Only Lonely, After Hours and Marshmallow World and Other Holiday Favorites. Other than a 2003 Mavericks album, this is his first original set in a good, long time. The stylistic range he packed into the twelve songs is true-to-form.

“I try to put the best songs I can on the record, and if they’re all different then so be it,” Malo explains. “Unless we’re doing some Bulgarian classical folk music, I think it’s related anyways. And part of it goes back to [the fact that] I grew up listening to all kinds of music. I remember listening to everything from The Beatles to Glen Miller to the Eagles to the Police on AM radio.”

Not that the resulting variety—yet another thing about Malo’s music that’s contrary to the mainstream these days—is all that calculated.

“There has been nothing thought-out or planned in my life,” he marvels with amusement. “Are you kidding me? As a matter of fact, it has driven many a manager crazy, many an accountant crazy. I wouldn’t have it any other way. I don’t want to know what I’m doing next year. I don’t even want to know what I’m doing tomorrow.”

AGE: 43
HOMETOWN: MIAMI, FLORIDA
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