If you laid the resumes of Marco Gutierrez, Trinidad Leal, Daniel Davis, Eric Harrison, and Colin Gilmore side by side you’d pretty quickly figure they were going to play together in a band, if not in this timeline in another. Turns out it is in this one, and the west Texas native sons have just released their full-length debut album under the moniker West Texas Exiles. It’s called 8000 Days and it’s just the music you think it would be, only better.
The record’s title track is in some respects an origin story. Although it name checks places in El Paso, Gutierrez’ birthplace, the notion of escaping 22 years (aka 8000 days) in the desert has to apply equally well to Lubbock and Amarillo, where the other band members grew up. From there the tracks get into some coming-of-age wisdom. Cards is a snappy, two-step friendly, number about realizing you have to be true to yourself. Circles In the Yard has a grittier rock feeling, but when Gilmore notes that dreams, “they don’t come free,” you can’t help but sigh in agreement.
Like any good country LP there’s an offering of love songs as well. Bright Yellow Sun is a little bit jangly with its metaphor of brightness and warmth making love feel “like the first day of my life.” Dark Desire turns to the noir side when the pursuer will do “anything to get closer to you.” Way We Are is one of two Gilmore compositions and channels his dad’s band, The Flatlanders, into an admission of never having it so good. At the other end of that spectrum is Division, a tale of an initially beautiful relationship finally ending with both sides “exhausted from the years we fought,” and featuring Kelly Willis on vocals.
Some bands take years to hone a musical chemistry that propels them forward. In the case of the West Texas Exiles, that simpatico vibe started long before they knew each other, based on geographical upbringings and musical interests. When they formed in 2023, they started pumping out songs full of Texas music soul extending way beyond their two years together. 8000 Days promises to be the beginning of a storied catalog.
About the author: I've actually driven from Tehatchapee to Tonopah. And I've seen Dallas from a DC-9 at night.