Overview

Don Caballero was an American instrumental and progressive rock band formed in 1991 and disbanded in 2009. They released two of the most influential math rock albums: Don Caballero 2 and What Burns Never Returns.

Album Score
Don Caballero 2 (1995) 9
What Burns Never Returns (1998) 8

Don Caballero 2

Back in High School i was taught that some infinities are bigger than others. How could this be? Isn’t the set of numbers from 1 to infinity the same as the set of numbers from 2 to infinity? Well, yes, but this thinking style lacks something essential: a proper scope. Then i learned about cardinalities: the cardinality of the natural numbers is lower than the cardinality of the real numbers, for instance. And whenever someone asks me what is the hardest artist to cover, they expect me to tell them some “underground” unheard of Black Metal artist, which features a virtuoso guitarist and perfectly-timed drummer. This can’t be further from truth. As i lacked the scope to define infinity, some people lack the scope to define complexity. Don Caballero is undoubtedly amongst the best rock bands of the 1990s and early 2000s: they meshed virtually all arrays and derivatives of metal and math rock existent at the time into their almost one-hour-long magnum opus Don Caballero 2.

Don Caballero features the talents of Damon “Che” Fitzgerald on drums, Matt Jenick on bass, and Mike Banfield and Ian Williams (future Battles member) on guitar. They formed in 1991 in Pennsylvania, and released four (relevant) studio albums: For Respect, Don Caballero 2, What Burns Never Returns, and American Don.

Don Caballero 2 isn’t an easy-going album. It features many movements hidden withing single songs, sudden pace changes, heavy syncopation, instrument dissonance (reminiscent of the Magic Band in Trout Mask Replica), atypical time signatures, and unorthodox instrument-picking (please refer to Please Tokyo, Please This is Tokyo 7:17).

When i think of complexity, i think of Don Caballero’s exercise in controlled chaos in this album. The concept of “musical complexity” mustn’t be a simile for virtuosity. For instance, many consider Jimi Hendrix or Billy Gibbons (of ZZ Top) as the greatest guitarists of all time. And, in a way, they are. But not for their creativity, but for their virtuosity: they could play many notes very fast. But listen to any of their efforts, and their music is hardly challenging: it features the usual 4/4 beats, (a bit plain) traditional song structures, etc. These are musicians that defined the sound stream rock would follow in the 70s and 80s. But what about the sound that rock would follow in the future?

Don Caballero 2’s music is analogous to the cardinality of the real number: it’s infinite because we don’t even know how to start! Grab 1, and there’ll be a smaller number. Grab 0.0000001, and there’ll be a smaller number. Grab 10-50, and there’ll be a smaller number. Alas, there are no real starting and end points in the parts of Don Caballero 2’s tracks (mainly because de facto there are no song parts). To cover any of the songs present in there is to learn how to play several different tracks and then mesh them together.

70s and 80s rock is analogous to the cardinality of the natural numbers: we know it starts in one, then two follows, then three follows, and so on. To learn to cover, say, Guns’ N Roses, is to learn a static song structure and follow a steady rhythm notation

In the opening track, Stupid Puma, they make a brief resume on what metal music has accomplished: in the first section alone, there are 5 movements:

00:00 - 00:25
00:26 - 00:43
00:44 - 00:48
(The second one is repeated)
00:58 - 01:17
01:17 - 01:27

Each featuring a different metal style. From the beginning, Don Caballero clearly states its presence.

Then comes Please Tokio, Please This is Tokio (a personal favourite). It is tiring to list all the movements present in this track, but i think it’s worth to mention some of my favourites (named by me):

The pseudo-ballad: 00:51 - 01:13
The "28 Days Later soundtrack": 01:13 - 01:21
The generic metal song riff: 03:17 - 03:42
Damon "Che"'s "solo": 03:51 - 04:20
The loosing: 06:11 - 06:50
AAA WTF IS GOING ONNNNNN: 06:52 - 11:18.

The next tracks follow a similar suite:

  • P, P, P, antless features acrobatic drumming from Damon “Che” (i still have trouble thinking about everything he has in mind when he played this song live);

  • Repeat Defender is a story on its own: lasting a bit more than 10 minutes, the song’s pseudo-sections, triggered by Williams and Baffield, feed the continuum constructed by Damon “Che”, and features an ear-piercing middle section, which applies the Brechtian method, and completely isolates any buildup constructed;

  • Dick Suffers is Furious With You is a prime example of ordered chaos: a faux-drone interlude, followed by almost heroic arena rock, which, is juxtaposed along metal riffs and deviations. Sometimes these two converge, sometimes they coexist, and sometimes they annihilate each other;

  • Cold Knees (in April), the droniest section of the album (but perhaps less drone-esque than the Please Tokio finale), which seems to understand the scope of what hid in between Spiderland’s essence;

  • Rollerblade Success History, an amorphous, anti-time signature, “free-rock”, and actually really fun, entity.

Don Caballero 2 may as well be one of rock music’s most valuable and representative works: one can listen the influence of most of the latter rock deviations in the veins of this album. There’s always something else to discover. Perhaps it is Damon Che’s unorthodox, gymnastic drumming, perhaps it is Ian William’s urgent guitar, perhaps it is Mike Banfield’s looping and distortion, or perhaps it’s just Matt Jenick’s quiet, shy bass, in appreciation (and perhaps admiration) for all of his partners. This is methodical, erudite rock. This is the womb of math rock.