Review: PUYA

PUYA
““Union””
(MCA)

One the most anticipated new albums.  Reason?  PUYA are the COOLEST latino flavored metal outfit I’ve come across yet.  “This is the PUYA coming straight to ya.”  Their previous album personally dubbed ‘Salsa-Metal’ showed a unit capable of sounding like something you’d find in a classy Mexican restaurant, but then come crashing with the big d-tuned metal crunch.  Mixing it up while not sounding like a band just putting styles end to end, PUYA’s newest “Union” shows more metal, less ethnic flavor.  But there is always this undercurrent of rhythm that is spiced with that infectious move-your-ass beat.  While the rap-rock mixed with (insert clever sub genre here) is a VERY tired concept, do not miss out on PUYA simply because of convenient labels.  Their music has so much range, mood and melody coupled with the ability to just break it all apart and rage, it should be at least sampled and given a chance on its own merits.  Their previous album had a more sassy delivery due to the more prominent use of the more latino sounding instrumentation and liberal use of Spanish lyrics.  But “Union” is stripped and straight ahead, so those lost on the ethnic tip might swallow this more easily.  The prominent ethnic flavoring coming from the percussions and rhythmic instruments.  Songs like “Erizo”,  “Numbed” and “Si Aja” delivered entirely/mostly in Spanish will always speak clearly of where this band comes from just incase there was any fear of them being lumped into whole nu-metal rap-rock wave.  Puya is a unique band simply because you could get multiple first impressions depending solely on what song was shown to you first.  Bottom line, this album rocks front to back with a few unexpected flairs cutesy of the Latino influences.