Dos Santos - City of Mirrors (2021) [Official Digital Download]

City of Mirrors is a bold new collection of music from Chicago-based alt-Latinx band Dos Santos, which is comprised of bandleader / singer / lyricst / guitarist / keyboardist Alex Chavez, drummer Daniel Villarreal, percussionist Peter “Maestro” Vale, bassist Jaime Garza, and guitarist/multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Nathan Karagianis. Cinematic in its journey, the album was produced by multimedia artist and long-time friend of the band Elliot Bergman (NOMO, Wild Belle), and reflects sounds from across the Americas combined with Chavez’s compelling poetic narratives. Its 13 tracks consolidate the band’s unique identities, creative and cultural roots, and their penchant for honoring traditional Latinx music with contemporary compositional expressions and production techniques.

It achieves the band’s mission to push against their own musical boundaries while also exploring themes of social justice, immigration, and contemporary human struggle. Chavez, a scholar who has produced albums for Smithsonian Folkways and conducted extensive ethnographic work on the music of the Texan US/Mexican borderlands (where he is from), articulates beautifully: “City of Mirrors is an assemblage… glimpses of tradition… reflections on our collective present… luminous echoes between love and solitude, hope and absurdity, euphoria and mourning. This album grapples with and transgresses these binaries because we have/and continue to cross borders. Yet, for us, the border is no metaphor — too much real staring back at us. We embody the border. We (our families) have crossed it. We (our stories) are coated with its residues. And so… we cross the border of self through our art – out of necessity.”

Tracklist
1. A Shot in the Dark (03:14)
2. Alma Cósmica (02:07)
3. A Tu Lado (03:15)
4. City of Mirrors (03:08)
5. Glorieta (02:28)
6. White. Lies. (02:51)
7. Palo Santo (03:01)
8. Crown Me (03:23)
9. Ghost. Me. (03:49)
10. Soledad (03:27)
11. Cages and Palaces (02:19)
12. Jaguar de Rosas (01:58)
13. Lejos de Ti (03:08)