Actually, Marco, I'm completely in agreement with you about the Ry
Cooder collaboration with Buena Vista, in that I think I would have enjoyed
the album much more without his slide guitar noodlings throughout. I dunno
if you guys can see where I'm coming from here, but I felt that perhaps Ry
was intentionally trying to put his stamp on this record and make it a Ry
Cooder project, rather than just letting the Cubans do their stuff.
Although I enjoy his guitar playing, I found Ry's playing on this disc
intrusive and somewhat arrogant (yeah, I know, I'm interpreting here). This
is indigenous music which is unique to that wonderful island, so I find Ry's
participation bothersome; leave 'em do it the way they've always done it.
With the embargo and all, I think I would have respected him a helluva lot
more if he would have left the musicians play what they felt rather than
having to collaborate with an Americano.
Stimp
----- Original Message -----
From: "Marco Pringle" <freakymarco@yahoo.com>
To: "joni ." <kitty429@hotmail.com>; <acid-jazz@ucsd.edu>
Sent: Friday, December 08, 2000 5:46 PM
Subject: Re: slightly OT: Buena Vista Social Club
> Hi Joni (and rest of Listees...),
>
> --- "joni ." <kitty429@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> 1 Are these two groups related to eachother and if so how?
> 2 Does anyone know which of their albums are best or is
> there a particular album that is better to pick up from
> these latin Gods!?
>
> --- Stimp <stimp@sympatico.ca> wrote:
>
> > To answer your question, although both
> > records came out at approximately the same time, they
> > don't have anything (that I know of) to do with each
> > other.
>
> > The Buena Vista Social Club got the huge, well
> > deserved props that it did mostly because it's a Ry
> > Cooder collaboration, and Warner knows that anything that
> > Ry Cooder touches turns to gold.
> >
>
> Yes, as Juuso Koponen noted, both the Buena Vista Social
> Club and the Afro-Cuban All Stars share many similarities,
> including singers, musicians, and labels, while being
> produced and Exec-produced by the same people (Ry Cooder
> and Nick Gold, respectively).
>
> With apologies to Stimp, while Ry Cooder's collaboration
> may have added many resources for promotion, etc., in my
> opinion, BVSC succeeds _in spite of_ his input. His
> intrusions on slide and electric guitar licks seem
> distinctly out of place. For my money, the ACAS' first
> album, 'A Toda Cuba Le Gusta', is the better buy because
> Cooder's intrusions are fewer, and the prowess of these
> cuban luminaries is left to shine (their second album,
> 'Distinto, Differente' provides much of the same, although
> I think I like the first one better - but that might be
> because I've had the chance to listen to it more).
>
> With the success of these two releases, just about everyone
> featured on these releases put out their own solo album,
> with titles from Ruben Gonzales, Ibrahim Ferrer, Iliades
> Ochoa, Compay Segondo, and Omara Portuondo. In addition
> there have been many "roots of buena vista"-type albums,
> some which feature early vintage recordings of said
> artists. In truth, it's been quite hard to keep tabs on
> all these releases, and because of their ubiquity, i'm
> starting to take a 'been there, heard that' attitude to all
> these cuban/latin releases, and all the tracks start
> sounding the same after a while. I can attest to having
> listened to the Ferrer and Portuondo albums, and quite
> enjoyed them. I also liked the Gonzales recording.
>
> Branching out a bit, you might want to look at what some
> other labels have been putting out. Cubop has been
> releasing and re-releasing solid latin recordings for years
> now. Their most recent 'Viva Cubop' compilation might be a
> good place to start. Six Degrees records has also been
> putting out a bunch of dance-floor friendly dance records.
> Their recent 'Cuba Without Borders' has a very similar feel
> to the BVSC and ACAS records.
>
> And then if you want to bring it back to the acid jazz
> topic, there's a couple of recordings which kinda hafta be
> mentioned here: Six Degrees' 'Latin Travels' album and
> Ubiquity's 'New Latinaires' series. Latin Travels features
> new work with a heavy latin sound from all our favourite
> producers including Fila Brazillia, St-Germain, Bob
> Holroyd, and (AJ list favourites) Jazzanova. The 'New
> Latinaires' series' tracks are either new work, or vintage
> work that has been remixed and brought up to speed.
> Although there's three in the series at this time (More to
> come, I'm sure), I quite like the second one; The dnb-ish
> P'taah track is a standout, even amongst other great tracks
> from latin masters Papo Vasquez and Francisco Aquabella,
> and house master Joe Clausell (no Jazzanova track on this
> one, but there is one on volume one...)
>
> Maybe your local library might have some of these titles so
> you can preview them to see which you prefer before going
> out and buying them. Although with christmas coming, it's
> hard not to get into the spirit of mass consumerism...
>
> Best of Luck,
>
>
> =====
> Marco Pringle, host of
> the Fat Beat Diet - Way late, Tues nights/wed morning
> CJSW 90.9FM (Calgary) - in real audio at:
> http://www.cjsw.com
>
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