: In 1999, your band of fourteen years released its greatest musical statement thus far. How do you follow it up?


A: Um, you don’t.


OK, so this isn’t totally the case with Giant Sand’s latest joint, Cover Magazine, but it’s pretty darn close.


The aforementioned musical statement is, of course, the group’s astonishing Chore of Enchantment. Recorded in the wake of the death of Rainer Ptacek, front man Howe Gelb’s former bandmate and best friend, the album played like a desert-rock version of The Flaming Lips’ Soft Bulletin. It was a thoughtful meditation on life, love, and death, made by a band that had seen it all, and lived to tell about. Gelb’s rich baritone took on a sagely quality that had escaped him in the past. While an air of sadness drifted through the album’s sixteen tracks, an inescapably joyful sensation ran over them as well. No longer the stylistically indecisive rambler that he once was, Gelb emerged from the album as a true elder-statesman, and, most likely, a new man altogether. The years following Chore would see the release of a Giant Sand retrospective (Selections Circa 1990-2000), and two Gelb solo albums (last year’s Confluence and the recently released Lull Some Piano, both on Thrill Jockey), but the question remained: how would they follow up on such an important record? Well, Nirvana released the most thrilling, honest, and revealing album of their career. Pavement retreated to the warped nucleuses of their own minds. Kevin Shields just plain didn’t. In the end, Giant Sand pretty much managed to do all of these things at once.


Instead of attempting to reinvent their sound or trying their hand at some new songs, the band opts to lay back, have a good time, and reel out some of their favorite tunes, and while Cover Magazine isn’t as rewarding as Chore, it’s an equally enjoyable listen. As for the song selection, well, what do you expect from Giant Sand? Theirs is a world where X and Boxcar Willie live side by side, right down the street from Sonny & Cher. The band are unabashed purveyors of the notion that any song can be covered by anyone, anywhere, at any time, and Cover Magazine turns out all the better because of it. Kicking off with a wandering piano bit, the album slips gently into the country standard “El Paso”, that makes up half of a medley that also contains Neil Young‘s “Out On A Weekend”. It’s obvious from the outset that this album is one to be enjoyed, not critiqued. One gets the feeling that it could have been recorded in Gelb’s living room, amongst his friends, during a long night spent spinning old yarns, and drinking ‘til dawn. Therein lies both the strength and weakness of Cover Magazine.


The songs that work best are, surprisingly, the ones that shouldn’t. Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man”, a song that always bored the hell out of me, is treated to a straggling bossanova beat that is augmented by trickling-water sound effects, and Gelb’s ubiquitous piano. Instead of overstating the song’s sinister lyrics like Ozzy Osbourne did, Gelb reduces the words to a throaty whisper, and quietly reinvents the song as a backwoods ghost story. P.J. Harvey (whose “Plants and Rags” is covered elsewhere on the album) lends vocals to X’s “Johnny Hit And Run Pauline”, whose sparse acoustic backdrop erupts into a storm of wailing vocals and furious strumming. One of Cover Magazine’s indisputable highlights though, is the group’s jazzy, cool-as-ice take on Sonny & Cher’s “The Beat Goes On”. The song is a testament both Giant Sand’s crack musicianship (which, it is worth mentioning, is more frayed than usual this time around), and Gelb’s unique vision. Other highlights include a ramshackle rundown of “King of The Road”, a road-weary take on Johnny Cash’s “Wayfaring Stranger”, and a touching version of Ptacek’s “The Inner Flame”. Elsewhere, however, songs begin to sound too similar to one another. Although the band may be having fun taking a stab at them, they sometimes fail to add anything new to the song, much to the listener’s expense (a prime example being “Red Right Hand”, previously performed by Nick Cave).


In Cover Magazine, Giant Sand has made the record that they have always deserved to make. While it’s difficult to nail down who exactly their contemporaries are due to their frequently shifting styles, it is equally challenging to imagine anyone else doing what they did here. What’s more, a project such as this can only do wonders to bridge the gap between Chore of Enchantment and its real, official follow-up. By coming back together as a group and getting back in the groove without sacrificing new material in the process, the band will hopefully be able to concentrate better the next time around. And besides, being brilliant is all well and good, but sometimes you just want to kick back and take it all in.