Mike O’Hehir, the man at the heart of Coyote Island, is an old soul, but the music he’s crafted with his band and growing collection of diverse collaborators is as fresh as anything going today. From the breezy and bouncy mix of Caribbean beats and contemporary pop production that blasted “Here Before” into the post-pandemic public consciousness to the meditative and moody organ that makes “Shine through the Darkness” a glimmering beacon for lost souls, his songs are mood enhancements and attitude adjustments — perfect for a generation of music lovers looking for a path forward.
Now, to follow the breakout success of their 2023 album “Holy Illusion,” Coyote Island have released “Trust the Path,” featuring the Hip Abduction, the first single from a full-length they have plans to release this August. Much like everything to come from a band named for the coyote, often depicted as a wise and playful trickster in indigenous cultures, the sound is hard to pin down. It opens warm and inviting, walks into a skittering chorus, then brings in thundering drums and an ethereal guitar lead.
“You don’t have to please everyone/ You gotta listen to your soul now,” O’Hehir offers to open “Trust the Path,” and that sentiment is core to the Coyote Island ethos. As he has moved from itinerant troubadour criss-crossing the United States to rooted family man, he has put together a band fully invested in exploring the possibilities offered up by everything from reggae to folk, Afrobeats to Gypsy jazz, cumbia to psychedelia. Guitarist Amir Rivera, a co-writer on “Trust the Path,” is versatile and wily. Fans know anything can happen when he comes strutting toward the front of the stage. And the rhythm section of Garrett Jones on bass and Ryan Benoit on drums navigate the often complex rhythms in a way that makes them feel comfortable and familiar.
Not that you have to be some kind of musicologist to appreciate what Coyote Island is doing.
Like Khruangbin or Father John Misty, Vampire Weekend or Talking Heads, they take these authentic traditions and spin them into the future, bringing you along with them as they follow their own path, trusting that they’ll figure everything out along the way. Or won’t. It’s that sort of curiosity about the world that turns clubs into tent revivals, festivals into mystical experiences. The coyote is elusive, by nature. You sort of have to let go of the wheel and see what happens.
With new music on the way that will challenge anyone to predict what comes next, O’Hehir and crew find themselves creating deep connections to people via a shared vibration everyone can only hear for themselves: “It’s all about you,” he likes to tell folks. “You have to dance in authenticity.”
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