Sonoran Hope & Madness

Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers, Roger Clyne | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 12, 2002)
• Original Release Date: 2002
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Emma Java
• ASIN: B000060O1R
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #118,451 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Sonoran Hope and Madness

2. Colorblind Blues

3. Sleep Like a Baby

4. Ashes of San Miguel

5. Mile High and Risin'

6. Bury My Heart at the Trailer Park

7. Interlude (Home on the Range)

8. Buffalo

9. Smaller and Better Things

10. The Ballad of Lupe Montosa

11. Better Beautiful Than Perfect

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Una Soda, Por Favor?, March 10, 2002

By 

Jason N. Mical (Bellevue, WA, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sonoran Hope & Madness (Audio CD)

Since the dissolution of his previous band, The Refreshments, Roger Clyne has taken a more adult approach to his music, while still retaining the sense of humor and fun that made The Refreshments such a success. One of the pioneers of the Tempe, Arizona "salsa rock" scene, a form of pop-rock-country heavily influenced by sounds from across the Mexican border, Clyne chose the Peacemakers as his new musical outlet, buddy-ing up with another former Refreshment, a former Gin Blossom, and two members of Dead Hot Workshop. Their first album, Honky Tonk Union, was a best-seller on the Internet sales chart, and became a favorite at independent music stores across the US.

Clyne's world, which admittedly sounds like a fun place to visit, is chock-full of Tequila drinking contests, cactus-covered deserts, tender cowboy stalkers, and tragic Mexican heroes. It's a theme continued on Sonoran Hope and Madness, the latest CD from Clyne and Company, and their second studio-produced album. With firecracker bookends and an eye towards the worldly ("Colorblind Blues"), Sonoran Hope shows a sense of maturity developed by living life, but more importantly, choosing it. Perennial live favorite track "The Ballad of Lupe Montosa" makes its studio debut here, and Clyne returns to a bit of his pop-rock sensibilities on "Better Beautiful Than Perfect."

Although none of the songs stand out as catchy radio singles, that's a good thing; fans of The Peacemakers will say that the only way to experience the band is live, and studio-produced CDs lose a lot of the energy that made Clyne famous in the Tempe scene. Radio singles doomed The Refreshments, and The Peacemakers have taken a sagacious high road in refusing record deals from major labels to keep true to their original spirit and sound. In a world marked by musical cynicism, boy-band mania, and Britney Spears movies, it's refreshing to know that artists like Clyne and his band still remember what the sounds are all about. While not Beethoven, The Peacemakers offer the same kind of originality and quality that is the mark of all artists who love their craft above all else.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Music Can Touch Your Soul, If Properly Written, August 20, 2002

By 

"mikekathyp" (Gainesville, VA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sonoran Hope & Madness (Audio CD)

First off, let me say that I am not a Roger Clyne "groupie." I had never heard of him or his band until 4 months ago, and I have not seen them play live (a deficiency I hope to correct on September 7).

Second, I put an unusual emphasis on lyrics in the music that I like. It has to sound good too, of course, and there are inane songs that I like, but the vast majority of what I consider top-notch music has to have good lyrics.

Bottom line: "Sonoran Hope and Madness" is perhaps the best lyrical album I have ever heard. Like all great lyrical efforts, it works at several levels.

It can be a collection of disparate songs that happen to be on the same disc, each song standing on its own.

It can just be a series of good songs with catchy refrains for those who don't want to think when they listen.

It can be an album, with the music and the lyrics tied together to form a theme, or multiple themes. The themes can be, and will be, different between listeners because music at its best is a highly personal thing.

It can be all of the above, and touch your soul.

For me, "Sonoran Hope and Madness" is all of these. It is funny ("I learned to hate from a strip mine, love from a strip bar/Honesty and charity, I stole `em from a tip jar"). It is sublime ("In my dreams I will sleep like a baby"). It is poetic ("I see blue skies bleeding/Colors screaming/Some invisible thing is the enemy now"). It is raucous ("Don'tcha wanna tip the apple car over, baby?/Don'tcha wanna shoot an arrow at the sky?/The fruit is throbbing on the vine/So many castles to storm and so little time"). It is sad (There's bones on the beach and there's ashes in the jar/Ghosts in the air laughin' at us fools at the bar/And somewhere inside this river don't run to the sea no more"). It is inspirational ("Life is grand/Love is real/And beauty is everywhere").

"Sonoran Hope and Madness" is all these things, and so much more. I've listened to this album many times and pondered at length whether Roger Clyne is a songwriter or a poet. The answer is he is both, and that is very rare in today's music.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars album: 5 stars, live show: 6 stars. wow., October 13, 2003

By 

Jonathan R. Zuckerman (Arlington, VA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sonoran Hope & Madness (Audio CD)

I listenend to Roger Clyne while he was in the Refreshments and really appreciated his first album. He had a freshness and charismatic outlook that makes you younger for having heard it, and the way he seamlessly blends his Southwestern lifestyle with his music makes me at once envious of him and proud just to bear witness to it. I lamentably stopped paying attention to them after Fizzy Fuzzy Big and Buzzy and missed their second CD, Bottle and Fresh Horses. Then just recently I downloaded a bunch of songs from his catalog and to my great surprise I realized that not only had he not fallen off the face of the earth, but he has been steadily grinding out what may be the only true American music for the last decade with his new (sort of) band the Peacemakers. While I can't say with certainty that he has been getting better, I can say that he has been traveling in a (pretty) straight line and you can literally watch him grow from an immature young savant into a pensive and wise man. He has equipped himself with equally awesome band members. Danny Blanco, PH Naffah (from the Refreshments) and Steve Larson (from Dead Hot Workshop) all do a spectacular job but they are eclipsed by that divine young man Roger Clyne.