Mexicali, Baja Calif., and Calexico, Calif., have been called poster children for NAFTA. Though divided by the Mexican-American border, they are in fact one sprawling megalopolis. Neither fully American nor fully Mexican, and not yet a comfortable mixture of the two, they are geographically and psychically betwixt and between. Poised in an uneasy symbiosis, their commerce is a sign of hope; the sweatshops and maquiladoras (border factories) that fuel it, a sign of despair.
The group Calexico took its name rather randomly (from a sign during a road trip through Southern California). Yet the duo of multi-instrumentalists Joey Burns and John Convertino could be called the musical chroniclers of their namesake. On four ravishing albums, the group has captured the turbulent life of the border.
Convertino, a drummer, and Burns, a bassist, were best-known prior to Calexico for their work with the well-respected indie-rock unit, Giant Sand. They also played in the lounge group Friends of Dean Martinez. When their relationship with that group ended, they developed the low-fi, acoustic-based recordings originally made for their telephone answering machine into a proper project.