Gotan Project CD Review
Gotan Project
Lunático
(XL)
Parisians Phillipe Cohen Solal, Christoph Müller, and Eduardo Makaroff continue making dub-based tango, but this time went to the home country to do it. Guests include Calexico and Juan Carlos Cáceres.
The supremo DJs are known as international jet-setters, though occasionally they do travel on business. Gotan Project went to Argentina for Lunático, but only because the tango — half of their “thing” — is native to it. Unable to stop once it gets going, Lunático pulls European jazz through an electronic tango meatgrinder, obscuring boundaries and exploiting them at once. While Calexico are wasted (musically) on opener “Amor Porteño,” the result isn’t a wasted track. In fact, despite a handful of guests, Lunático feels entirely of one mind — cosmopolitan though it might be. The album falters when it runs into predictability (“Diferente”), though the tango isn’t without its rules now is it?
7
— Steve Forstneger
