i've never heard this tune, but i'm very into indian / indian based music
for dancing at the moment. where can one get it on vinyl?
rob
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Date: 12 Jul 2000 08:20:47 -0700
From: mkg@calle22.com
Subject: (exotica) Vallenato galore
> I wonder how Vallenato fits in with the other (my clumsy term) 'working
> class fun-time musics'? To my ears, there seems to be a common thread
> running through Polka, Klezmer, Tex-Mex, Tejano, Creole, Cajun, etc. Even
> ska has a bit of it. Does Vallenato fit in with these at all, or are the
> rhythms quite different?
Yes it is different. In all those genres you mention you have a clear stomping tempo, so even the most rhythm-challenged person can dance to it. Vallenato hasn't. The bass lines of the bass guitar really go all over the place, because the accordion does all the work (mellodies and bass), so the bass player can remain pretty 'uncommited' to the rest of the song.
The rhythm section consists of a drum (similar to a single conga) and a guy scratching something called a 'guacharaca', which makes a sound similar to that aluminium washing board used in Cajun music.
The singing, at least for my taste, is truly nerve-breaking. Loud, shouty and very emotional. Maybe it is because the poor singer has to compete volume-wise with all the other instruments (Vallenato groups without electric amplification are quite common).
The strange thing of Vallenato is that it is black popular music created in the coast that has become very big in the interior of Colombia, where there are not many black people and where the music of choice used to be Rancheras from Mexico. And this has changed only in the last decade or so.
Having said that I don't like it, I have to accept that there are some very beautiful lyrics. And also some (few) nice and quiet songs.
Bye,
Manuel
P.S. Sorry I took so long to reply, but I receive the digest version.
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Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 09:20:12 -0700 (PDT)
From: chuck <chuckmk@yahoo.com>
Subject: (exotica) Perez Prado/First Exotica Record
Voodoo Suite rocks my world these days! That song is tremendously wild. I luckily
picked up the lp a few months back in vg++ shape. The awesome Bear Family
released it with Prado's "Exotica Suite" on a 2fer cd with that great Bear Family
quality of sound and awesome liner notes. Voodoo suite is much hotter than
Exotica Suite.
It is my understanding that before Prado there was no music quite like his, similar
but not quite as mamboish. After Prado the world jumped on the mambo bandwagon.
Gotta love those latin dance crazes that swept the world! Tango/Rhumba/Mambo/Cha
Cha Cha I know I left out something.
Prado rules for me. In the 70s I would thrift his lps. Picked up an RCA Mexico 3
lp set that has the very best of the best Prado, original versions in mono! What a
song writer. I understand that Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom Time held a record
for a while as being number 1 on the pop charts for the longest. Love to mix Que
Rico Mambo in on the tiki Mardis Gras Carnival Parade, Mondo Kayo we do every year
for the last 19 years.
As for the first Exotica record, my vote goes to Xavier "Cugie" Cugat who in the
1930's recorded "Jungle Drums" An early cool version has Dinah Shore on vocals.
This song evokes the distant far off exotica lands/exotic feeling incorporated by
Baxter.
The thing about Jungle Drums is that I really believe there was an exotica song
before it, in the early 1930's for sure but I bet there was some exotica song that
goes back to the 1920s or even earlier. Whenever I hear 1920's music I am shocked
how they had figured pop music so well back then. Really some of it sounds like
1960s pop music or even some of the pop music today. Certainly ballads have
changed little over the last 80 years.
Easy listening in the Big Easy
Chuck
- --- Moritz R wrote:
> And he made the first Exotica record, "Voodoo Suite"!!!!! It's impossible to
