Blog - category "True Music Stories"
Rap-O-Clap-O for the Sexteto Electronico Moderno
Joe Bataan is a Filipino-American musician who is influenced by boogaloo and doo-wop. In 1965 he formed his first band after spending some time in prison as the leader of a local Puerto Rican street gang.
In 1973 he released an album named “Salsoul”: listen i.e. to “Latin Strut”. Salsoul was lingo for the musical culture of urban Latinos. In 1974 he co-founded Salsoul Records, a record company which has released about 300 disco 12” singles, including Joe Bataan himself with “Rap-O-Clap-O”, a hip hop hit in 1979:
In 2009 Joe Bataan released a new latin soul album “King of Latin Soul”. He was supported by the Barcelona based latin funk group Los Fulanos. Watch This:
“King of Latin Soul” was recorded for Spain's Vampisoul label. Also for that label Sexteto Electronico Moderno (a South American jazz rock combo) released “Sounds from the elegant world” in 2004, with the subtitle “Groovy night club music from Uruguay 1968-71”. The album has different styles from Brazillian bossa and latin jazz to instrumental soul with a typical Hammond organ sound and vibes. The band often made instrumental covers of soundtracks of blockbuster films. Listen to “Ramblin’”:
The first track of the album is called “Soul Nuevo” and is written by organist Armando Tirelli. Here is Armando with a live performance of that song:
The Delinquent Habits of Chicano Rappers
Delinquent Habits is the name of a Chicano hip hop group. In 1996, the group became internationally known with their single "Tres Delinquentes" selling over one million copies:
This group from Los Angeles originally consisted of 3 members (Los Tres Delinquentes), and they worked with Cypress Hill member Sen Dog and Puerto Rican rapper Hurricane G.
American hip hop group Cypress Hill was the first Latino group to have platinum and multi-platinum albums worldwide. For example, their second album “Black Sunday” with single “Insane in the membrane” went triple platinum in the US, selling 3.25 million copies:
Chicano rap is a fusion style of hip hop music, gangsta rap and Latin which is typically performed by musicians of Mexican descent. The first widely known Chicano rap artist was Kid Frost. He had a big hit with “La Raza”, a track on his debut album “Hispanic Causing Panic” in 1990:
Boogaloo - A deeper shade of soul
Ray Barretto (1929 – 2006) was a Puerto Rican conga player. He was heavily influenced by jazz musicians like Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Dizzy Gillespie. With his unique way of conga playing he was asked to play for a lot of jazz band leaders like Charlie parker and Tito Puente. Barretto became the Godfather of Latin Jazz.
In 1963 for the first time a Latin song entered the Billboard charts, it was called “El Watusi” and was recorded by Barretto in 1961. In 1993 the song was on the soundtrack of the movie Carlito’s Way with Al Pacino and Sean Penn.
In the 1950’s and 60’s a musical style “Boogaloo” arose as a fusion of the musical influences from Puerto Ricans, Cubans and Afro American bands playing in American clubs. The biggest Boogaloo hit of the 60’s was “Bang Bang” by the Joe Cuba Sextet. In fact, Boogaloo is the fusion of soul and R&B with Cuban mambo & son. Ray Barretto also experimented with the mixing of R&B and Latin music on his 1968 album “Acid”. The best known song of the album called “a deeper shade of soul”:
In 1990 the song was sampled by the Dutch band Urban Dance Quad. Here they are live at Pinkpop:
Other examples of Boogaloo are some covers of “Watermelon Man”. The original is a jazz standard written by Herbie Hancock released in 1962 in a grooving hard bop version. Here you can see a live performance of the song in 1991 by Herbie Hancock featuring Miles Davis (his last concert in Europe), and here a 1963 latin pop version by Afro-Cuban latin jazz percussionist Mongo Santamaria.
And here is a live performance by conga player, latin jazz band leader and salsa singer Poncho Sanchez at the Montreux Jazz Festival:
Ray Barretto:
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