Rolling Afro-Latin Music 2015 and onward: Salsa, Bomba, Merengue,Reggaeton, Bachata, Latin-Jazz and more

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It still doesn't do much for me, but I enjoy some Pupy-isms in it.

I hate what they do with the downbeat though (which has been de rigueur in timba for 15 years or more). To me it just totally deforms the beauty of the clave rhythmic framework.

_Rudipherous_, Monday, 15 June 2015 14:18 (eight years ago) link

And now, youtube, I did not mean puppy candela. Does that really make any more sense than Pupy candela?

_Rudipherous_, Monday, 15 June 2015 14:21 (eight years ago) link

Thanks for that. I am a fan of Pupy. I enjoyed he and his band live, and also what I have heard via recordings and video. Sacrilege I know, but I can largely deal with their timba downbeat

curmudgeon, Wednesday, 17 June 2015 15:15 (eight years ago) link

Saw La India sing freestyle and salsa live sometime between 2004 and 2008, she is back in the area down at the Palace tonight in a Virginia suburb of DC. Tempted to go again.

curmudgeon, Friday, 19 June 2015 14:49 (eight years ago) link

I'd like to see Pupy live. Here's another throwback-ish song from Pupy, this year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffaUuxWbGYE

_Rudipherous_, Saturday, 20 June 2015 21:53 (eight years ago) link

He's definitely done far more interesting things than either of those songs.

_Rudipherous_, Saturday, 20 June 2015 21:58 (eight years ago) link

Fabiano Do Nascimento - Dança do Tempo http://open.spotify.com/album/6PWdY8VAio3JPra3NJ3qq2

example (crüt), Thursday, 25 June 2015 15:15 (eight years ago) link

Brazilian? Will check him out. Wonder if he was written about here;

Brazilian Music

curmudgeon, Thursday, 25 June 2015 15:25 (eight years ago) link

I have been dancing to and having fun watching Peruvian Amazonian cumbia band Los Wembler's de Iquitos for free at the Smithsonian Folklife Fest. They are also playing Brooklyn July 9th. Their guitarist incorporates surf-rock licks in their sound and they helped inspire chicha music and have been linked to that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqV7m1n-1Zc

curmudgeon, Friday, 3 July 2015 14:12 (eight years ago) link

Like that sound, thanks for the rec, doubt I can make it.

I Want My LLTV (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 3 July 2015 14:37 (eight years ago) link

Fruko y sus Tesos are playing my town next Saturday night, July 11. It's at a club I can walk to from my house, and tickets are only $20. I am sorely tempted.

the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, 3 July 2015 15:08 (eight years ago) link

This is a quick, mid-year reminder that all available tracks mentioned on this thread (and a handful of album selections from each listed) are being posted as updated to the thread-specific Spotify playlist. I just did a top-to-bottom sweep prior to posting this message and have updated as of today with everything that's been added on Spotify since it was first mentioned.

41 tracks from all over the map

ILX's Rolling Latin / Afro-Latin 2015 Thread Spotify Playlist

like a giraffe of nah (forksclovetofu), Friday, 3 July 2015 15:26 (eight years ago) link

Although his voice is very weathered at this point, Jose Alberto can still sing. Would prefer a different (non- conjunto style) accompaniment, but I guess we can't be too choosy at this point:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfd3US84HmM

I haven't heard the entire album yet.

_Rudipherous_, Sunday, 5 July 2015 21:47 (eight years ago) link

Saw Jose Alberto live a couple times many years back and he put on great shows both times. Will check that out

curmudgeon, Monday, 6 July 2015 13:59 (eight years ago) link

More salsa choque. This one has a guest spot by Nejo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6sPuZkLlHk

_Rudipherous_, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:18 (eight years ago) link

Not the best thing ever, but pretty much the only recent type of salsa that doesn't put me to sleep.

Not salsa, but same act as above:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLxokkBQFaE

_Rudipherous_, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:26 (eight years ago) link

Yes to ChocQuibtown. Below is an hour live performance video of Peruvian Amazonian cumbia and surf band Los Wembler's de Iquitos, whose final US gig (I think) on their current tour is tonight at Tropicalia in DC

http://www.kennedy-center.org/explorer/videos/?id=M6387&type=A

curmudgeon, Friday, 10 July 2015 15:45 (eight years ago) link

three weeks pass...

Cuba's Los Van Van, led by the late founder's son are on a tour now. Have liked them live in the past:

07th WASHINGTON DC – Howard Theatre
08th NEW YORK CITY – Lehman Center
09th CHICAGO – Thalia Hall
13th LOS ANGELES – Conga Room
14th SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco Jazz Center
16th LAS VEGAS – Sam’s Town Hotel
19th ALBUQUERQUE – National Hispanic Cultural Center Plaza Mayor
20th DENVER – City Hall
21st NEW YORK CITY – BB King’s
22nd SAN JUAN, PR – Centro de Convenciones
28th ORLANDO – Majestic Convention center
29th MIAMI – James L Night Center

curmudgeon, Thursday, 6 August 2015 17:05 (eight years ago) link

two weeks pass...

Surely you mean his son, Arturo.

Is It POLLING, Bob? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 24 August 2015 18:35 (eight years ago) link

Ha, of course.

Speaking of Cubans, the current version of Buena Vista Social Club is on tour and the Pedrito Martinez Group is opening.

curmudgeon, Monday, 24 August 2015 20:09 (eight years ago) link

Author Ned Sublette is doing tours of Cuba starting soon. Twice a year I think

curmudgeon, Thursday, 27 August 2015 19:08 (eight years ago) link

This YouTube channel is pretty great. A lot of amazing album covers.

http://www.youtube.com/user/carlosgulfo/videos

the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Thursday, 27 August 2015 19:30 (eight years ago) link

http://www.billboard.com/charts/latin-songs

Put here to remind me to check out some pop

curmudgeon, Friday, 28 August 2015 15:29 (eight years ago) link

Will do the above shortly, as I was checking out a live review of ArcAngel and De la Ghetto, reggaetoners who still/used to make the charts.

But Saturday night I instead saw NYC based Cuban percussionist/singer Pedrito Martinez and his combo do a half-hour opening set for Buena Vista Social Club(4 oldtimers plus 9 newer folks of various ages) out at Wolf Trap Park. Very enjoyable all around.

curmudgeon, Monday, 31 August 2015 15:24 (eight years ago) link

The 2015 edition of Jerry Gonzalez & The Fort Apache Band is at the Blue Note in NYC this week. Brother Andy G is just there on certain nights. Tain Watts is drumming

curmudgeon, Wednesday, 2 September 2015 23:12 (eight years ago) link

I guess he still lives in Spain now. No US gigs anywhere else

curmudgeon, Thursday, 3 September 2015 15:23 (eight years ago) link

Today on Burning Ambulance, I premiered a track from Banda de los Muertos, a group of Brooklyn jazz dudes who play Mexican banda, and do it straight up, no Tzadik-y "let's mix it with Cambodian surf rock!" BS. Check it out if you want.

the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Thursday, 3 September 2015 16:43 (eight years ago) link

Thanks. I am barely keeping up on another ilx contributor's blog that covers banda and more

http://nortenoblog.com/2015/09/02/who-played-it-better-ariel-camacho-or-these-dudes/

curmudgeon, Friday, 4 September 2015 14:07 (eight years ago) link

Wow, that Youtube old-school salsa channel with the album covers linked above is something...

curmudgeon, Monday, 7 September 2015 05:03 (eight years ago) link

So that Brooklyn banda band mentioned upthread just got mentioned on NPR Morning Edition ( a focus on 3 albums their global music person likes--others were a Bollywood soundtrack and a Sekou Keita kora one). But has a Mexican banda band ever been mentioned at NPR I wonder?

curmudgeon, Tuesday, 8 September 2015 20:12 (eight years ago) link

Worked late so i did not see Pedrito Martinez group on their return to DC-- a free gig on the front plaza of the Kennedy Center near the special temporary skateboarding bowl that was set up there. Woo hoo, Afro-Cuban jazz and skaters. They have had multiple genre acts out there. There might be video of them up on the K. Ctr Mill. Stage website.

Wanna see and dance to Oscar D'Leon this weekend, but I have a conflict. He was great years ago when I saw him at a late night gig

curmudgeon, Friday, 11 September 2015 18:51 (eight years ago) link

Curious about bilingual Mexican pop-rapper Becky G, who is getting lots of attention these days

curmudgeon, Tuesday, 15 September 2015 16:33 (eight years ago) link

Plus Dafnis Prieto and band's new Latin-jazz effort Triangles and Circles

curmudgeon, Tuesday, 15 September 2015 18:23 (eight years ago) link

More than 20,000 recorded tracks by the likes of Irakere, Los Van Van, Bola de Nieve, Ibrahim Ferrer and Omara Portuondo, among many others, will get new life thanks to a global licensing agreement struck Tuesday (Sept. 15) between Sony Music Entertainment and the Havana-based Egrem (Empresa de Grabaciones y Ediciones Musicales, or Enterprise of Recordings and Musical Editions in English).

With U.S. & Cuba Relations Thawing, Cuban Musicians Are Ready to Come to America

Egrem’s catalog, the most extensive catalog of Cuban music in the world, encompasses audio and audiovisual recordings produced since the 1960s.

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6699585/sony-egrem-cuban-music-catalog-agreement

_Rudipherous_, Wednesday, 16 September 2015 19:44 (eight years ago) link

(Oops. Didn't edit that cut and paste properly.)

_Rudipherous_, Wednesday, 16 September 2015 19:45 (eight years ago) link

good enough to get the point across about all that music

curmudgeon, Thursday, 17 September 2015 19:15 (eight years ago) link

http://www.billboard.com/photos/6686047/50-most-essential-latin-albums-past-50-years/6

There's probably another thread I should put this on

curmudgeon, Friday, 18 September 2015 13:42 (eight years ago) link

Never liked Mana

More from Billboard

http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/latin/6693102/bogota-music-market-colombian-artists-you-need-to-know

curmudgeon, Friday, 18 September 2015 13:45 (eight years ago) link

Interesting list. I've heard 13 of those, and there are a few more I'd like to check out.

the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, 18 September 2015 14:03 (eight years ago) link

N#d S#bl%tte on Egram and Cuban music and the US

Cuban music was repressed in Miami through terrorism -- I remember one DJ who played Cuban music on a non-commercial station there checking his car in the morning for bombs -- through repudio (organized mob action), through blacklisting of performers who traveled to Cuba, and under an absolute ironclad boycott enforced by Miami broadcasters, who wouldn't even take payola to play it, and ultimately by advertisers. "I'll play it when there is a free Cuba," said one Miami program director to me on the phone when I brought him NG La Banda in 1992, in tones of moral righteousness that I have never otherwise heard in hit-driven radio, about any issue.

It had consequences. The greatest, most innovative Latin dance music of the 90s -- Los Van Van, NG La Banda, Adalberto y Su Son, Charanga Habanera, Paulito Y Su Elite, Manolito y Su Trabuco, and many more -- achieved musical immortality, and built fan bases in cities all around the world, but they didn't get the kind of commercial rewards they merited, as mainstream outlets pretended this music just didn't exist. The genre of timba was mediatically silenced while it was at its apogee in about 1992 though '97, contributing to the climate in which the Buena Vista Social Club movie could popularize an image of a Cuba bereft of contemporary culture, though nothing could have been further from the truth.

Cuban artists occasionally wound up as a low-priority release on one or another major label, typically acquired as part of a foreign catalog from a third country, but generally were not heard on major labels or on US radio or TV, for reasons that had nothing to with content. (Though there was also the fact that the artists were generally blacker than most of what's allowed on corporate Spanish-language TV, which seems to take place in some Spanish-speaking white universe.) There still seems to be a commercial radio boycott of Cuban music in the US, but now that people under 30 don't know what a radio is and have stopped buying records, it matters much less.

curmudgeon, Friday, 18 September 2015 16:11 (eight years ago) link

Oops,didn't c & P the section on Egrem (now spelled right) just the latter portion

curmudgeon, Friday, 18 September 2015 16:13 (eight years ago) link

It had consequences. The greatest, most innovative Latin dance music of the 90s -- Los Van Van, NG La Banda, Adalberto y Su Son, Charanga Habanera, Paulito Y Su Elite, Manolito y Su Trabuco, and many more

It may be the most innovative, but I still think these bands are all overrated (yes, including Van Van). I wish there had been no embargo so that I wouldn't have to hear timba boosters belly aching about how their music missed its chance to become wildly popular with Latin music fans in the U.S.

_Rudipherous_, Saturday, 19 September 2015 02:32 (eight years ago) link

The only Palmieri on the 50 album list is the mediocre collaboration with Tito Puente?

_Rudipherous_, Saturday, 19 September 2015 02:38 (eight years ago) link

Looks like a number of the salsa selections are collaborations. Too many glitzy glossy balladeers on that list for me, but other choices are of interest

curmudgeon, Saturday, 19 September 2015 13:42 (eight years ago) link

This is a quick, third-quarter reminder that all available tracks mentioned on this thread (and/or an album selection from each listed) are being updated to the thread-specific Spotify playlist as posted. I just did another top-to-bottom sweep prior to posting this message and have revised as of today with everything that's been added since first mentioned. Subscribe if you're into it!

It's 62 tracks, over 4 hours long.

Rolling Latin / Afro-Latin 2015 Thread Spotify Playlist

Meta Forksclove-Liebeskind (forksclovetofu), Monday, 28 September 2015 16:24 (eight years ago) link

So cool that you're doing this!

niels, Tuesday, 29 September 2015 09:40 (eight years ago) link

Dafnis Prieto and band's new Latin jazz effort Triangles and Circles

Finally listened...It's a decent jazz record.

curmudgeon, Tuesday, 29 September 2015 18:31 (eight years ago) link


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