Description
Cuba: Music and Revolution: Culture Clash in Havana: Experiments in Latin Music 1975-85 Vol. 1 is the new album compiled by Gilles Peterson and Stuart Baker (Soul Jazz Records) that explores the many new styles that emerged in Cuba in the 1970s as Jazz, Funk, Brazilian Tropicalia and even Disco mixed together with Latin and Salsa on the island as Cuban artists experimented with new musical forms created in the unique socialist state of Cuba.
The album comes as a heavyweight triple vinyl and deluxe double CD, complete with extensive sleeve notes, and is jam-packed with heavy bass lines, synth and Wah-Wah guitar funk combined with the heavyweight percussion, powerful brass lines and the all-encompassing Latin rhythms of Cuban music known throughout the world.
The album is released to coincide with the massive new deluxe large format book Cuba: Music and Revolution: Original Cover Art of Cuban Music: Record Sleeve Designs of Revolutionary Cuba 1959-90, published in November, which is also compiled by Gilles Peterson and Stuart Baker (Soul Jazz Records), and which features the music and record designs of Cuba, made in the 30-year period following the Cuban Revolution.
The music on this album features legendary Cuban groups such as Irakere, Los Van Van and Pablo Milanés as well as a host of lesser known artists such as the radical Grupo De Experimentación, Juan Pablo Torres and Algo Nuevo, Grupo Monumental and Orquesta Ritmo Oriental, groups whose names remain largely unknown outside of Cuba owing to the now 60-year old US trade embargo which remains in place today and which prevents trade with Cuba – and thus most Cuban records were only ever available in Cuba or in ex-Soviet Union states.
The music on this album reflects the most cutting-edge of Cuban groups that were recording in Cuba in the 1970s and 1980s – who were all searching for a new Cuban identity and new musical forms that reflected both the Afro-Cuban cultural heritage of a nation that gave birth to Latin music – and its new position as a socialist state. Most of the music featured on this album have never been heard outside of Cuba.
Both Gilles Peterson and Stuart Baker have been involved in Cuban music for more than two decades – Gilles Peterson with his many Havana Cultura projects for his Brownswood label and Stuart Baker with a number of Soul Jazz Records albums recorded in Cuba. This Soul Jazz Records album is released in conjunction with Egrem, the Cuban state record company, and has been put together after the many crate-digging trips that both compilers have made on the streets of Havana and beyond in Cuba stretching over a 20-year period, searching out rare and elusive original Cuban vinyl records.
Tracklisting:
A1. Grupo Irakere – Chequere Son
A2. Conjunto Rumbavana – El Son Del Campeon
A3. Juan Formell & Los Van Van – Mi Ritmo Caliente
B1. Grupo Monumental – Mi Son Caridad
B2. Grupo de Experimentación Sonora del ICAIC – Sondeando
B3. Las D’Aida – Con Cadencia y Con Dulzura
B4. Juan Formell & Los Van Van – Y No Le Conviene
C1. Pablo Milanés – Te Quiero Porque Te Quiero
C2. Emíliano Salvador – Luna Wanestain
C3. Los Reyes 73 – Un Lamento Hecho Cancion
D1. Eduardo Ramos – Vocación Revolución
D2. Grupo Mounmental – Hasta Las Cuantas
D3. Los 5 U 4 – Solo Esta Musica
D4. Grupo de Experimentación Sonora del ICAIC – Canción Con Todos
D5. Orquesta Los Van Van – Yo Se Que Van Van
E1. Grupo Monumental – Nadie Se Siente Cansado
E2. Orquesta Ritmo Oriental – Maria, Baila El Son
E3. Juan Pablo Torres y Algo Nuevo – Rompe Cocorioco
E4. Los Reyes 73 – Grandes Amigos
F1. Paquito D’Rivera – La Patica
F2. Grupo de Experimentación Sonora del ICAIC – Grifo
F3. Raúl Gómez – Dacapo
F4. Grupo Irakere – Juana 1600
