Chilly Gonzales – Gonzo Review

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On and on the joys of Chilly Gonzales go. For those who hopped aboard his French charms when Jarvis Cocker joined him for a lounge-pop powerhouse, Room 29, this will feel like a close brush with home. Autobiographical, allegedly. The spoken-word parts of this Gonzales album may leave much to be desired when hearing the delivery, writing and styling but it is in line with the chamber joys of his previous works. French Kiss clearly did not deliver the satisfaction Gonzales seeks on Gonzo, the fictionalized account of his career and life formed by the deplorable perfection Hunter S. Thompson would rally through in his glory days. Gonzo offers a chance to hear Gonzales talk about himself and his achievements. Talk being the operative word.  

Opening track Gonzo feels off-kilter and childish considering the depth Gonzales could pull from. He seems to think of himself as nothing more than a performing animal who can rhyme words. This is all he does for this opener, popping into French language and braggadocios vibrato for the sake of it. It is hard to clamber aboard a project where the singer refers to themselves as “Chilly G”. Making an autobiographical work without the self-deprecating humour necessary is a death knell. For a man with fifty-two years of life experience, Gonzo feels emptied of incident. Surfing the Crowd is a mangled horror show of nerd rap and slam poetry. Take the worst bundles of such an experience and piece them together, staple it to one another and hold firm to this egotistical view Gonzales holds. Either he genuinely believes it and more fool him for doing so, or he is humorlessly kicking his past. Whatever the case there is a lack of understanding from Gonzales as to how he should engage his experiences.  

Gonzo has some of the worst lyrical displays from this year. The linked-up ideas Gonzales has throughout these pieces is a fascinating deep dive into a man with surface-level conjunctives at his disposal. Cheese pizzas, Ron Jeremy and a desire to surf through the crowd like, you guessed it, a bird in the clouds. Primitive writing to say the least, and it derails much of the instrumental passion heard on Gonzo. The death of ego has plenty of merit as a topic for an artist sticking around as long as Gonzales. High as a Kite, and the wider identity of Gonzo is a chance for him to grasp the nettle and come to terms with his image. He did it better on French Kiss, and at least his preceding album did not have this awful, performative notion to it. Gonzales has his head in the clouds, looks down, and sees only the basics.  

Gonzales is best here when he stops speaking. Fidelo and Open the Kimono benefits from a wonderful instrumental section, the latter ruined by lyrical dreck. Substandard scribbles from a man who should be more than capable of exploring his career, the messages he has been given and the insight he has gained, on better terms. Instead, it is ghouls, reflections, and simple rhyming structures which tank his hopes of an ego-driven ride. Even with a sense of irony to those self-centred aggrandizations, there is nothing lyrically speaking to consider as a truthful choice. Gonzo lacks the very definition of what Gonzales wants. He is no Hunter S. Thompson. A shame to waste these instrumentals on this.