Ezequiel Peña - 20 Herraduras De Oro (CD)

All Music Guide

The fact that Ezequiel Peña has, on more than one occasion, posed in sombreros on his album covers (sometimes on horseback) tells you a lot about his musical outlook. For a Mexican vocalist like Peña, wearing a sombrero is sort of like a power metal revivalist having extremely long hair or a retroswing musician sporting a ‘40sstyle hardboiled detective lookit might seem stereotypical, dated and anachronistic to some (how many Mexican artists even own sombreros these days?), but it lets you know that Peña is very committed to his style of music. And that commitment comes through quite clearly on 20 Herraduras de Oro, a bestof collection focusing on the singer's Fonovisa output of the ‘90s and 2000s. For the most part, Peña's work isn't simply Latin pop with Mexican overtonesthere's nothing wrong with that approach, but Peña is usually a lot more traditional in his outlook. That isn't to say that he is a total purist; some of the gems on this 2004 release (which offers a 20song, 63minute audio CD and a bonus DVD containing seven of Peña's videos) were written by Mexican superstar Marco Antonio Solis, who is hardly a stranger to Latin pop. But if Peña makes some pop moves on occasion, 20 Herraduras de Oro is traditionminded more often than not. Peña's cultural heritage is people like José Alfredo Jiménez), Alberto Vazquez and Lola Beltrán, and he wears that heritage like a badge of honor on these inspired, emotional performances (many of which fall into the banda category, although Peña gets into some mariachi and ranchera as well). Peña's Fonovisa output has been impressively consistentmost of his Fonovisa releases are well worth owningbut for novices who are seeking an introductory overview of his work, 20 Herraduras de Oro would be an enriching and logical starting point.

- Alex Henderson, All Music Guide