Cruz de Navajas

  The weekend of June 2nd was fortunately busy for me. Zanias, Fee Lion, Visceral Anatomy on Friday and Cruz De Navajas from Mexico City on Saturday at Burlington.  I came home with the shirt. I mean...that is a bad ass name to have on a fucking shirt. Oh...it means "cross of knives".  They have a six track Demo on Bandcamp. They formed in 2016. I don't know if their name is a reference to a song from Mecano, this legendary Spanish rock band from the 80s. It keeps popping up on my YouTube searches. I mean...great if it was in reference to them. Alright, what was my line?.....It was pouring rain as I was parking. Closed a rain soaked umbrella as I walked past the door and into the back where I was barely in time. Made it to the front somehow. It seemed like a wall of people closed behind me. I recognized familiar faces in that first row. ...Alex, Sarah, William. This was the kind of show that inspires the audience to wear their death rock best. I was happy to see this come from Mexico.  I can honestly say that I saw more for this show than for Zanias the night before. For me....I was lucky to see both.  Its all different shades of the same world. Cruz De Navajas started in 2016.  The lead singer is Sharon.
    The bass...was it....It commands a pace that is in the range of death rock and punk. Leans...messy bass. Not clean, agile bass like New Model Army. Messier than that and so a bit labored, no less urgent, and sometimes brooding heavy.  Did that sound like a complaint. No...its a feature for me, not a bug. They describe themselves as dark dance-able post punk. They remind me a lot of this band I saw only once and I got the vinyl for it, Rhythm Of Cruelty.  I saw them at Burlington that one time.  Cruz De Navajas at least wears the death rock, post punk identity on their sleeves and the singer even wore this white wedding dress as if just married to it.  They are balls deep in the culture, and they pull it out of the crowd that saw them. I can think of no other kind of community that would be as into it as the crowd that showed up. As I research them, I grow more fond of them.  I even found a video of their Chicago gig! Songs are starting to sink in individually. They sound to me like old school post punk with lyrics dealing with femicide, forced disappearances of people. Both of those things happen in Mexico.  Happens a lot. Part of what I see in the punk identity, the music.... you must have a fucking problem. Hmm, that sounded wrong. I mean, something has to bother you, fuck with you. Reporters or rural teachers, people with a capacity and availability to speak truth to power are being disappeared. Women, especially poor women are being murdered, cases go unsolved. And that says something. It is great that these are subjects in their lyrics. I like their version of The Mirror Breaks, originally from The Mob. Did not know that, and I heard it first from Cruz. .........So they get interviewed and they talk about what they write in their lyrics, and that gets you to listen closely again. When they say deep shit....and in spanish....its profound and scholarly. Perhaps that can be due to my worsening practice of the language. Everything sounds magnanimous, especially when it hits a certain way.  So now I'm into SPK, Suna, Imperialismo, I can go on. Its post punk from post punk fans. I'm gonna put them next to them bands with a dominant driving bass guitar, Walking Bicycles, Staring Problem.
Zig