Album Review: The Crossing by Alejandro Escovedo

While preview single "Outlaw for You" plus word of cameos from James Williamson (Stooges) and Wayne Kramer (MC5) indicated Alejandro Escovedo's 12th studio LP might lean punk, The Crossing doesn't boomarang back to the Texan's slam-rock roots. Instead, teamed with Italian cinematic rockers Don Antonio, he and group leader Antonio Gramentieri become Mexican Diego and Italian Salvo searching for the America of the New York Dolls, Ramones, and Jack Kerouac. "I saw the Zeros and they looked like me/ This is the America I want to be!" exults Diego on "Sonica USA," alluding to Javier Escovedo's L.A.

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In 2000, Alejandro Escovedo wrote a play with music titled By the Hand of the Father, a moving song cycle that dealt with the Mexican-American experience as families left one home behind in hopes of finding another on the other side of the border. Escovedo is the son of one such man, and By the Hand of the Father was informed by the lives of his own family members. In 2018, Escovedo explores not dissimilar themes on his concept album The Crossing, but instead of telling the story of his father and those like him, here he imagines a story of two expatriates not unlike himself, and what their lives might be like if they made their way to America in these times.

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In the 15 years since Green Day lambasted the Bush administration with “American Idiot,” rock music's cultural cache has dwindled to its lowest point. Decades from now, documentary footage about Trump-era racial animus and immigration policy will likely by soundtracked by the likes of Kendrick Lamar and Run the Jewels, not the electric-guitar protest songs of yore. That, though, isn't stopping veteran rocker Alejandro Escovedo from trying his best to sound of the moment.

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Photo by Nancy Rankin Escovedo For his latest album The Crossing, songwriter Escovedo draws on a surfeit of influences — personal history, musical history, the recent past, contemporary American culture and the cultures of at least two other countries — for an expansive look at what the immigration experience can look like. The 17-song concept album tells, loosely, the story of two immigrants to the US, Salvo from Italy and Diego from Mexico. The story proves to be less effective than the impressions it leaves, but Escovedo's partnership with a new band introduces new sounds into his work, creating an uneven but still impressive work.

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