Hombre Lobo: 12 Songs of Desire[1] is the seventh studio album by American rock band Eels, released on June 2, 2009. Hombre Lobo is Spanish for "werewolf". On March 31, 2009, the band made the track "Fresh Blood" available on Spinner.com,[2] explaining that the song would be the lead single for the album. A documentary entitled Tremendous Dynamite was filmed to document the recording of the album.[3] The cover art is a tribute to the famous Cuban cigar brand Cohiba.
The songs form a concept album about arrogance and pride (.[citation needed] As frontman Mark Oliver "E" Everett explained, "I wanted to write a set of songs about desire. That dreadful, intense want that gets you into all sorts of situations that can change your life in big ways."[4] In part, the album was inspired by E's facial hair[5] and written as a sequel to the Souljacker song "Dog Faced Boy".[6] The character of "Dog Faced Boy" has grown up into a werewolf and is the protagonist who experiences various types of desire throughout the songs.[7] In an interview with NPR on June 6, 2009, Everett stated, "That Look You Give That Guy" is his favorite song from the album.[8]
The album was released as a single CD in Europe on Polydor/Vagrant, an enhanced CD with the Tremendous Dynamite documentary in the United States through E Works/Vagrant,[11] a deluxe edition CD with a DVD, and a limited-edition vinyl LP with gold embossing with a print run of 2,000. It is also sold digitally from the iTunes Store; pre-ordered copies receive a copy of the music video for "Prizefighter".[4]
Marketing
Prior to the album's release, Eels promoted it with music videos for "Fresh Blood" (premiered April 29),[12] "That Look You Give That Guy" (May 14),[13] "Prizefighter", and "In My Dreams" (July 7).[14] The band also briefly used a Twitter account to generate hype for the album.[15]
"Fresh Blood" was used in the June 2010 trailer for the third season of HBO's True Blood, as well as the ending credits of episode 11, season 3. It was also used as the closing song for the season 6 premiere episode of FX's series Rescue Me. It was also used as the theme song for the HBO docu-series The Jinx.
The album has a score of 70/100 on Metacritic, indicating "generally positive reviews".[26] One negative review of the album came again from Ian Cohen of Pitchfork, who gave the album 4.6 out of 10, finding much of the album repeating previous themes present in the Eels catalogue, saying "The tracks on Hombre Lobo that aren't juke-joint pastiche sink into Everett's comfort zone of impotent longing, the trouble with dreams, and the general shittiness of putting your faith in other people."[20]
Thom Jurek of AllMusic noted, "The sound of the album seems divided in two, the brazenly rockist set betraying the side of animal instinct in all its guises, from anger to wanton lust, desperation, and swaggering self-confidence,", finding the album to be "This is a beautifully crafted, stripped-down recording, showcasing once more that E uses searing honesty and a canny sense of pop, rock, blues, and everything else to chronicle his own strange path through life and its labyrinth -- he combines them all with an endearing craziness that most of us feel every day, but dare not speak of."[27]
Track listing
All songs written by E and Kelly Logsdon, except where noted
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
