New Music Reviews
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
El Santo dances with James Brown: Brownout serves up afro-latin groove, Tejano-style
To even begin to glean the multitude of influences that converge in Brownout´s second CD, Aguilas y Cobras, it´s worth the time to check out the video created by Miguel Alvarez for the track “Slinky” (Alvarez is a filmmaker who also functions as the group´s VJ). The video features Sun Ra, El Santo (the masked Mexican lucha libre hero), and late-night Spanish-language TV clips from Mexican action films from the 70´s, not to mention a pair of flying laser-throwing eyeballs. And that´s just for starters!
A collective based in Austin, Texas Brownout´s eight members also perform along with two other musicians as the Grammy-nominated Grupo Fantasma. Their musical sensibility emerges from being thoroughly comfortable with both sides of the Rio Grande, as half of its members hail from the border town of Laredo. Their blend of Latino roots music, African American funk, psychedelic rock and Tejano border grooves explodes in funky bass lines, aggressive horns, hip-hopped congas, and fierce guitar licks. Along the way, their primarily instrumental pieces draw inspiration in 1970s legends such as Sly and the Family Stone, Santana, Joe Bataan, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix and the West Coast band Malo, (led by Jorge Santana, Carlos´ brother).
Their danceable grooves sometimes touch on more serious topics – one of the only three songs that has lyrics,“Con El Cuete”, speaks in metaphor of the senseless drug violence of Laredo, Texas (“cuete” is slang for gun). However, most of the songs are just pure unadulterated funk without words. The Big Easy inspires classic funk in “Nawlins”. Other songs, such as “Framed By Death” highlight the Latin influences with conga, guiro and a brass-driven jazzy cha-cha-cha in a minor key. In “Olvidalo”, Brownout approaches the psychedelic salsa more often heard when the musicians play as Grupo Fantasma, a group where the influence of singer/percussionist José Galeano is added and comes to the foreground. (Galeano is the nephew of José “Chepito” Areas, the timbalero from the original Santana band.) On other tunes, the percussion even incorporates a certain hip-hop tendency – so even though the sounds hearken back to mostly the seventies, they always come off fresh and smart.
Funk fans will find a lot to love in the tight and cohesive production of Aguilas y Cobras, where Brownout plays its Latin Funk with a cool swagger.
Catalina María Johnson, Ph.D. is a writer, as well as host and producer of “Beat Latino” (Latin music programs for Public Radio)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Calle 13’s “Los de Atrás Vienen Conmigo”
La musica urbana se trata de respeto
Se trata de quién escribiendo es el que domina mejor el alfabeto
Urban music is about respect
It’s about which writer is the one in total command of the alphabet
“Que lloren” from Los de Atrás Vienen Conmigo
Calle 13, two stepbrothers from Puerto Rico, are creating a hybrid sound that takes off from a Latin Urban groove to become the most politically-savvy yet danceable sound of recent years. And they´re winning awards by the cartload in the process. With Los de Atrás Vienen Conmigo, this year Calle 13 added five more Latin Grammy notches to their musical belt (Best Urban Album, Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Latin Alternative Song, Best Short Music Video), topping the three Latin Grammy´s they won for their second CD, Residente o Visitante, and the Grammy they won for their first, Calle 13.
Vocalist Residente (born René Pérez Joglar) has a Master’s in art from the Savannah College of Art and Design and musician/producer Visitante (Eduardo José Cabra Martínez), studied music at the University of Puerto Rico. Now in their early thirties, they first met at the age of two, when Residente´s mother married Visitante´s father (though the couple is now divorced). Their name as well as their aliases are said to come from the fact that Cabra visited his brother regularly at Pérez’s residence, which was on Calle 13 (13th Street) whereas the reverse rarely happened. Hence, he was the “visitor,” whereas Pérez was the “resident.”
Esto no es Reggaeton
Pero como quieras bailas un montón
This is not reggaeton
But you can dance a lot, any way you want
“Fiesta de Locos”, from Los de Atrás Vienen Conmigo
The duo´s music is often categorized as “reggaeton”, a genre which certainly influenced their music to a degree — the characteristic Jamaican “dem bow” rhythm frames many of the melodies, while Residente raps over the beats. However, in “Que lloren”, the opening song on Los De Atrás Vienen Conmigo, the reproach to that genre´s exponents is framed in a wickedly funny horn-laden oom-pah-pah-rap, showing that they see themselves and indeed they are in a very different musical space.
Although some of the lyrics approach the swaggering bravado and raunchy sexual posturing that characterizes much of both rap and reggaeton, thankfully Residente most often takes aim at a variety of political and social targets, applying his thoroughly literate talents to a biting satire that turns angry at times, darkly humorous at others. All the while Visitante explores a variety of rhythms from the Latino musical universe, often in artful collaborations such as with Mexican roquero icons Café Tacuba in the polka-rock-romantic ballad “No Hay Nadie Como Tú”, which builds upon accordeon riffs. On “Fiesta de Locos,” the brass section takes you somewhere between the Balkans and New Orleans, ably accompanied on vocals by PG-13, their younger sister. The lyrical “La Perla” pays homage to the beauty of one of the capital city’s roughest neighborhoods, culminating with a powerful call and response between Calle 13 and the great veteran salsero from Panama, Ruban Blades. On this last song, perhaps the most accomplished of all in the CD, Visitante borrows not only Blades’ salsa beat, but incorporates a bass samba drum and weaves the song in and out of the traditional afrouruguayan candombe rhythm.
The result of all these globe-hopping beats: a compelling work of musical art, where the lyrics are smart, the style is cosmopolitan, and the rhythms set you dancing to a masterful mash-up of our Americas, a place where many of us can reside and most will happily visit.
Catalina María Johnson, Ph.D. is a writer, as well as host and producer of “Beat Latino” (Latin music programs for Public Radio)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Cantora: Mercedes Sosa´s Grand Finale
Cantora: Minstrel (feminine), songstress, woman who sings
Mercedes Sosa, known as: ”The Voice of the Americas”, was an enormous presence in the lives of several generations of Latin Americans – in every possible way. She was a large woman, frequently garbed in a brightly-colored Andean poncho that swayed when she sang. Her powerful voice, of a rich and unusual timbre, seemed to emerge from the depths of her being to reach out and touch listeners directly.
It is hard to remember a time when this songstress, who passed away in early October at the age of seventy-four, was not a part of the soundtracks of our lives or of our parents’ lives. From days of adolescence when many of us picked up guitars and learned Latin American protest songs, we learned through her of other musicians who had been silenced by death at the orders of dictators and how she had fled Argentina and exiled herself shortly after she as well as her audience had been detained by police interrupting a concert in progress. Later, we enjoyed the CD’s that had celebrated her triumphant return to a post-dictatorship Argentina, and finally in recent years, discovered in delight that she would fearlessly apply her marvelous voice more contemporary rhythms.
Her latest album, released internationally simply as “Cantora”, is a selection from the duets that were released in Latin America as two separate volumes. In “Cantora”, Sosa collaborates with a highly distinguished roster of Latino singers and songwriters, some of which are a generation or even two younger than she, easily deploying her voice in melodies that blend her folk into pop, rock, alternative, and even hip-hop.
Her voice, at seventy-three, is not that of the seventeen-year-old Haydee Mercedes, whose professional “cantora” career took off after she easily won a radio contest in her native town of Tucuman, Argentina. In these that would be her final recordings, time has given it gravelly edges, yet it remains an awe-inspiring instrument and provides a formidable challenge to the younger musicians. Although Shakira does seem daunted by the challenge of being side-by-side with Sosa, emoting a shade too enthusiastically in “La Maza”, most of the musicians such as Lila Downs in “Razon para Vivir”, dialogue vocally with Sosa with great affection and respect, and without even a hint of what would be a most futile intention to compete. Singing with Julieta Venegas in “Sabiéndose de los Descalzos,” which sings of being poor, and tired, and having no shoes, Mercedes Sosa stays faithful to her commitment to singing about the plight of the disenfranchised. The mix of genres on the CD works well for all involved – one of the most surprising and successful collaborations occurs with Calle 13, young hip-hoperos from Puerto Rico, who in “Hay un Niño en la Calle” poignantly entreat in call and response with Sosa in favor of Latin America´s homeless youth.
The album succeeds and indeed, one could say, that Mercedes Sosa’s sixty-year career marked such an indelible history in our lives, precisely because she always remains true to her own voice as part of the “Nueva Canción” – New Song – the folk song movement that swept through Latin America in the seventies, expressing hopes and dreams for a better world. In this fitting finale to an extraordinary career, one of our greatest cantoras passes the torch to a newer generation of singers, that they not forget that music still has the power to transform the world.
Catalina María Johnson, Ph.D. is a writer, as well as host and producer of “Beat Latino” (Latin music programs for Public Radio)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
The Queen of Landó still rules: Eva Ayllón´s “Kimba Fa”
De los barcos portugueses
Portuguese ships
allí me trajeron a la abuela
Brought my grandmother here
la trajeron de Guinea
They brought her from Guinea
con escala en Cartagena
Stopping over in Cartagena
mercaderes españoles
Spanish merchant ships
la trajeron más al sur
Brought her further south
y por eso estoy cantando
And that is why I sing
ritmo negro del Perú
Black rhythms from Peru
María Angélica Ayllón Urbina (whose stage name “Eva” honors the maternal grandmother who taught her music at an early age) has encompassed a variety of Latin American and Peruvian genres in the course of nearly thirty years as a beloved figure of the Peruvian musical landscape. However, she is best known for her fiery renditions of afro-peruvian melodies, in a style which emerged in Ayllon´s hometown of Lima with the 1950s “black pride” movement, demanding recognition of the cultural contribution of nearly half a million Peruvians of African descent.
Ayllon´s latest CD, “Kimba Fa”, which means “free and joyous energy” takes its title from “Quimba, Fa, Malambo, Ñeque”, a glossary of the expressions used by African descendants in Peru. The seventeen tracks on “Kimba Fa”, transport the listener on a delightful paseo through Peruvian musical history, and along the way give due recognition to several of its luminaries.
Amador is a song in the afro-peruvian panalivio style, much beloved by the recently-deceased maestro it celebrates: Don Amador Ballumbrosio. The panalivio, also known as penalivio (a song for curing sorrow, or alivio de pena) often sings against exploitation and is accompanied by the violin and the percussive footwork of the zapateo, both of which were excelled at by Don Amador. Ayllon´s rendition of the Peruvian pop hit Akundun (the fragment of lyrics at the beginning is from this song) also renders tribute to Don Amador, who participated in the original ground-breaking 1993 fusion of rock, rap, African and Andean rhythms – all of which are also heard in Ayllon´s version.
Landó, the cornerstone of afro-peruvian genres which evolved after the sixteenth century from the Angolan “lundu”, was dominated so completely by Ayllon that she was given the title “Queen of Landó”. The elegant, intertwined and seductive cadences of the landó are used to transform the Mexican song Adoro, originally composed and popularized as a bolero (highly romantic style of Cuban torch songs which spread throughout Latin America in the 40s and 50s).
Another classic afro-peruvian rhythm, the festejo (from the Spanish fiesta) a celebratory genre first documented in Lima´s religious processions several hundred years ago, is featured in the song Mi compadre Nicolas which in true festejo style, takes off with the textured, shirred rattling of the signature afro-peruvian instrument, the quijada de burro, or donkey jawbone.
Ayllón also pays homage in the CD to legendary composer and singer Chabuca Granda. A friend of Ayllon´s since her adolescent days, Granda was instrumental in making the vals criollo (Peruvian Creole music) widely known throughout Latin America. This genre, which incorporated the European waltz brought over by the Spaniards during colonial times, is well represented in Kimba Fa with two compositions by Granda (El Surco and Maria Sueños) as well as the classics Toro Mata, Mal Paso and Nada Soy.
A few of Kimba Fa´s tunes travel into pop and jazzy regions somewhat less successfully, where a shade too much orchestration and the inclusion of less traditional instruments such as the piano don’t frame Ayllon´s marvelous voice nearly as well as the Creole and afro-peruvian melodies, which she rips into with powerful, soaring abandon, creating highly danceable and richly textured counterpoints between her voice , the filigreed guitar notes and the crisp percussion of the cajón (box drum) or the rattling jawbone.
The beginnings of Peru’s Afro rhythms are lost in the history of the Americas, but Latin Grammy-nominated Kimba Fa offers wonderful witness and honor to the peoples that brought those rhythms, proving that as Queen of Landó, Eva Ayllon still rules.
Catalina María Johnson, Ph.D. is a writer, as well as host and producer of “Beat Latino” (Latin music programs for Public Radio)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Agua del Pozo:
Nuevisima trova emerges in the open land between Artemisa and British Columbia
Agua del Pozo, the lyrical collection of thirteen tracks by Alex Cuba (Alexis Puente), Cuban singer/songwriter/multinstrumentalist now based in Canada, surprises in its accomplished interchange between funky soulified pop hooks, delicate guitar riffs and a voice that layers a velvety sheen over the textures of Cuban folk music. And all of this sweetened with a touch of jazz – Agua del Pozo is a collection of ballads and gentle tunes meant to be savored slowly.
“Artemisa, la tierra que me ha dado la sonrisa”
Artemisa, the land that gave me my smile
Considered one of the rising stars of the Cuban diaspora, Alex Cuba spent his childhood in Artemisa, one hour west of La Habana. He credits the influences of North American musicians such as Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson and The Blind Boys of Alabama equally with a rich heritage that includes the free musical education of Cuba and an illustrious musical family. Alex originally created music with his brother Adonis, who co-wrote two of the songs on Agua Del Pozo. His father, renowned guitar player and music teacher, Valentin Puentes, also participates in Agua, singing back-up vocals on the track “Que Bongó”.
“Esta es mi morumba cubana, donde mezclo de todo
Con sabor a más nada, que mi propio sabor”
“This is my Cuban morumba, where I mix it all up
with no other flavors other than my own”
“Agua del Pozo” earned Alex Cuba his second Juno (Canadian Grammy) for Best World Music album of 2008 following his first Juno for Humo de Tabaco two years earlier. His sophomore album evolves assuredly from his debut, moving away from traditional acoustic instrumentation and introducing Alex’s electric guitar, a vintage Gibson. Although some of the tracks veer closely to a purely pop sound, he manages to keep his relaxed vibe fresh by taking it back repeatedly to the more satisfying foundation of Cuban folk and roots from the 19th and 20th centuries – his guitar at times reminiscent of changüí, a style of Cuban music which arose in the sugar cane refineries and rural communities of Guantanamo, combining the Spanish canción with African rhythms and percussion of Bantu origin; his lyrics in the tradition of the great trovadores or troubadors, who earned their living singing trova accompanied by the guitar, a tradition from which would later emerge the revolutionary nueva trova, the Cuban protest music of the sixties and seventies.
“Yea yea, yea yea yea yea ”
Alex Cuba’s poetic lyrics speak of love and romance, joy, sadness and even Afro-Cuban religion. Yet although his songs are in Spanish, when he performs live, perfectly suited-up in a thoroughly retro look – complete with substantial afro, sideburns, and multi-colored bell-bottoms, he often beckons to the audience to sing along with a wide and engaging smile. No language is needed for the chorus of “Amor Infinito” (yea yea, yea yea yea yea) nor to understand that we are experiencing a truly original artist: a thoroughly Cuban musician who comfortably wears the clothing and melodies of recent decades of USA soul. An artist who brings together a series of disparate traditions and lands, fully living up to his birth name – “Puentes” – which after all, means,“bridges”.
Catalina María Johnson, Ph.D. is a writer, as well as host and producer of “Beat Latino” (Latin music programs for Public Radio)
