Desaparecidos - Read Music / Speak Spanish (2002)I just read that the name "Desaparecidos" means "The one's who disappeared", which is remarkably poignant considering this band was as quickly gone as they were here.
Junior year of high school, I met two of my closest friends and music buddies, Ryan and Sterling. As the music culture started to take a more concrete shape, we eventually found each other amidst suburban Arizona teens and found a bond through music (so emo) We were constantly digging through artists, eventually even dominating the Horizon TV announcements by picking OUR background tunes, me hosting a music segment and them creating D.I.Y. music videos set to artists like Pavement. We spent a good portion of our time comparing our interests and exchanging music, which is how I got Desaparecidos. We all had a mutual love for Conor Oberst, but I was unaware of his "side-project" until Ryan brought it up. We agreed to do a mixtape trade (seriously, actual tapes) : I would make him a tape of some of The Format's music and he would give me Desaparecidos. I still remember loading it in my walkman and holding Ryan's scratching of the track titles.
Previous to that, I had considered myself punk rock. Come to find out, I wasn't even CLOSE. Since we're going through my high school years, I feel the need to point out that I was 15 or 16 years old, which I suppose goes against the theme of this being "unapologetic". But there were also things I just WISH I could have understood, like the directon of Read Music / Speak Spanish. This was the manic end of the spectrum for Oberst, who fluctuated between that and happy during most of the Bright Eyes albums. However this was truly an outlet for a kid who grew up in Omaha and had a lot to talk about for such a boring city.
While "punk rock" bands like The Ataris were still singing mostly about girls, this album follows a heavy theme of the fear of gentrification, especially in what I would consider would be a fairly untainted Omaha. It has some of the dialogue clips Bright Eyes was known for, only this time featuring interviews of girls in "what they look for in a guy" and two guys talking sarcastically about how great it will be to have a new Starbucks in their local mall. This entire album follows a trend of satire, luckily with Oberst's incredible smart wordsmanship at the helm.
The music is punk rock too. It's incredibly raw and really really fuzzy, but has just enough good production for you to catch the melodies and make it easy to make out the lyrics. It's as loud (and sloppy) as Oberst gets vocally and finds it self very keyboard and bass heavy. And heavy in general. It polarized some of the critics who were keeping a careful watch on Oberst to begin with.
I'm not about to go on here and discuss the political tones and what I agree or disagree wtih, because I doubt that's what they would have wanted. Each song describes a certain state of being and how commericalism has affected that, and it's sarcastic tone, while swaying you a certain way, obviously, also let's you decide for yourself by painting these pictures. For only being 9 songs long, it certainly had a lot to say, I only wish they could have pulled together long enough to say a little bit more.
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