Q+A: Raul Malo

Jerry Fink, Las Vegas Sun

Monday, Aug. 13, 2007 | 7:15 a.m.

Who: Raul Malo

When: 8 p.m. Friday

Where: The Ovation Lounge, Green Valley Ranch

Tickets: $9.95 to $24.95; 617-7777

Solo

"Today" (2001)

"The Nashville Acoustic Sessions" (2004)

"You're Only Lonely" (2006)

"After Hours" (2007)

with The Mavericks

"Mavericks" (1990)

"From Hell to Paradise" (1992)

"What a Crying Shame" (1994)

"Music for All Occasions" (1995)

"Trampoline" (1998)

"It's Now! It's Live!" (1998)

"The Mavericks" (2003)

"Live in Austin Texas" (2004)

with Los Super Seven

"Canto" (2001)

"Heard It on the X" (2005)

There's all kinds of country music. There's Merle Haggard country and Keith Urban country and Hank Snow country. Joining the mix is Raul Malo country. Malo, 42, is of Cuban descent, born in Miami, now a Nashville resident.

"I'm pretty sure I'm the only Cuban that has ever performed on the Grand Ol' Opry," said the founder and former frontman of The Mavericks.

Malo hasn't completely ignored his roots. He's occasionally part of Los Super Seven, a Latin American supergroup that won a Grammy Award in 1999.

But his first love is country.

Malo will perform at Green Valley Ranch's Ovation theater Friday , a stop on a national tour promoting his latest album , "After Hours," which contains such country nuggets as Buck Owens' "Crying Time," Hank Williams' "Cold, Cold Heart" and Kris Kristofferson's "For the Good Times."

It may seem odd to some that a singer of Cuban heritage growing up in Miami found his calling in the rudimentary sounds of basic country.

But Malo's country is a different kind of country, although the roots are the same, buried deep in the heart of the common man.

Q How did you end up singing country instead of Latin, in the vein of The Miami Sound Machine?

Honestly, when I was down there that stuff was all around me but for some reason - I enjoyed it, I certainly enjoyed listening to it - but as far as playing music, what I really liked was something a bit more organic, a bit more rootsy, a bit more guitar-oriented. So I just started turning more toward the country-folk-rockabilly-jazz stuff. I just gravitated toward that. I can't really explain why. It was very appealing to me. I always liked the big band singers. I always liked people like Bobby Darin, Louis Prima and Frank Sinatra , and couple that with Buck Owens and Johnny Cash and Elvis. I just kind of listened to it all. I really liked a lot of the real distinct voices from that era.

You have taken a more sophisticated approach to country. Is that natural for you?

I think so. I've always liked kind of blurring the lines anyway. We did that some with The Mavericks. We always tried to do our own little thing. I guess just by the natural way that I sing we just kind of gravitate towards that. When we were making this record, "After Hours," and arranging this record we certainly had that in mind. We just arranged the songs according to the way that I sang and that's how we ended with the sound on this record that we got. Also, I did want to show a little bit more of an elegant, sophisticated side to country music that doesn't get shown often, that's for sure.

What was your thinking process in the song selections?

I've always felt that we're always - we as a society, as a culture, as an industry - we're always quick to point out how different all the music genres are. The jazz purists will never listen to country music and the county music purists will never listen to jazz, and the divisions continue. But there are certain moments in our brief history where everything does collide and sometimes the end result is a nice thing. And so we wanted to kind of show these songs in a different light and show how these can be treated as pop standards. First of all, they're great songs. They're as good as anything, I think, that Irving Berlin wrote or Cole Porter wrote, but they just happened to have been in the country and western world. But with a little different arrangement, low and behold we're uptown, and that's kind of what we wanted to show on this record. We can relate to one another through the realm of music.

Do you think you might do another album in this vein?

I don't know. There are certainly plenty of those kinds of songs to record. It gets tougher to find songs in the modern era to fit with these arrangements. But that's not to say that it can't be done. Mostly we just have to kind of pick from yesterday.

What happened with The Mavericks?

I guess to sum it up, I left the band. The reason was because I wanted to make records like this and kind of do things at my own pace. I didn't want to be in a band anymore. I wanted to either take all the blame or all the credit. When you're in a band people have different agendas, which I understand, which is why I left the band. I think, internally, it was just starting to - I wouldn't say not get along, but it wasn't great and when you do something for so long and it starts to become a chore, when music starts to not be fun , it's time to do something else.

How long were you together?

About 13 years. We had a good run. But, I think there comes a point where you've reached your creative peak and I think as a band we reached that and it was time to move on. Some people don't want to move on. It's really hard. I admire when bands stop. I'm glad the Beatles stopped making records.

I just interviewed REO Speedwagon, which has been together for 40 years.

Wow. I'm sure people love to hear them, but to me that has no appeal to me whatsoever. I don't want to be doing the same thing for 40 years. I like doing different things. I get bored easily. I need to constantly be challenging myself. I just can't imagine being in the same band for 40 years.

Are you working on some other projects?

I'm certainly focused on the immediate tour right now but that takes care of itself. We'll go out and work it hard. But the next project , I have about two albums' worth of original material, so I would imagine sometime next year we'll record an album of original songs. I'm sure it will be eclectic to some people. I think it's going to fall somewhere between where The Mavericks left off and maybe touch on some of the stuff I've done on my solo records.

Do you do much Latin music?

I've done those Los Super Seven records. They're really fun projects to be involved with. It's me, a couple of guys from Los Lobos and some others. It's sort of an under-the-radar kind of super group. We've made three records. One won a Grammy, the others have been nominated for Grammys. It's just been great. So I get that call every once in a while. It's just fun to do. Actually, I'm planning on doing an all-Spanish album in the near future; all the old, beautiful romantic songs.