This appears to be a fairly obscure release from the Kent label. Two brothers, Raphael and Ramon Velez front a loungey/soul band in this set of mostly original tunes with a few covers thrown in. The band is really tight throughout with great bass and drum work and the horn section is blazing. Recorded at [...]
Truth be told, I purchased this cassette a couple years ago on the promise of one measly songtitle “Pimpers Paradise” hoping for G-Funk or something. Now that I look at the other song-titles, it should have been pretty obvious to me that this was 80s (90s?!) Reggae or Soca, and quite likely deep doo doo. [...]
From what I can Google, Graciela Susana is an Argentinian singer who had a fair bit of success singing in Japanese for the Japan market in the 70s. This LP mixes more traditional pop fare with sparse latin/folk stylings. It’s a mixture of traditional songs and tracks written by Japanese writers which is pretty listenable [...]
Here’s one of my all time favorite 45′s from my collection, and probably the only cracked record I keep in the collection. It’s a Surinam single, pressed in Holland in 1978. The band name Fri Sranang is a combination of the Surinam creole language Sranang Tongo and Fri, which, I’m guessing, must mean free. Fri [...]
A fun instrumental exploito record from Colombia 1974. The cover, with face painted hippie chics and the title, “Colombians in Hippie Clothes”, promise at least some psychedelic music. The drum-organ-guitar-bass combo has more of a cool South American surf/go go sound but derails frequently enough. In fact, I was initially a bit disapointed in this [...]
One of my favorite finds this summer was this classy vanity lounge LP on the mysterious SAMHOT label which also boasts the legendary Gordon Thomas. There are some strange similarities between the two men’s vocal styles, and also a persuasion for singing odes to their favorite girls. I decided to post this one up now [...]
Smart sweater vest boogaloos.
Pretty great boogaloo. Yeah.
The budget Marble Arch label from the UK is one that I have a sort of love/hate relationship with. It’s one of those labels that some people actually try to collect the entire run even though in reality 85% of the releases on it are terrible. Here is their stab at a Reggaesploitation LP from [...]
For the last 15 years I have been trying to find out what Los Strwck translates to in English to no avail. I suspect it loosely means “Mariachi Fuzz Box”. I found this LP in East L.A. in the early 90′s and it’s dropped many a jaw over the last 15 years. The tunes start [...]
The sheer amount of non-(North) American records located in the greater Los Angeles area is mind boggling to say the least. One week I’ll come across a grip of Eastern European prog/folk records, the next week some Calypso 78s…just this past week I found a handful of Aboriginal field recordings and a stack of 20 [...]
For your dancing and listening pleasure.
Fans of Ralfi Pagan should appreciate this gem of a song from a dollar bin rescue, “What You Never Had To Lose”. Shadow Morton produces and he recreates a true New York sound-scape from 1974. Check out Tito Puente’s heavy rock riff on the timbale and the way it takes you back to the loping [...]
After a fire destroyed their popular club The Green Grotto along with all their equipment, the Swinging Stars from Dominica quickly came back on top again. It’s hard to imagine they had ever been better than on this record from 1978 because it’s really superb Cadenze in a jam mode, with excellent guitar and keyboard [...]
Al Collie and the VIPS was the houseband of “the IN spot in Nassau, the swinging Buccaneer Lounge at the Flagler Inn Hotel on beautiful Paradise Island.” The band played the typical mix of Calypso, almost-reggae and soul that features on so many private hand-out records from countless “In spots” on the Islands of the [...]
This record looks to be from the early sixties and was released on Columbia’s budget Harmony subsidiary. It provides rhythm accompaniment for dancers, singers, musicians, instructors and children. Essentially it is a record of drumbeats in a number of different styles. You get fox trots, rock and roll, polka and waltzes on side one.
 This album would be a perfectly OK record of mambos & cha chas but for one thing. It was released on Crown, yuck. As is reasonably common knowledge, most of Crown’s records sounded G+ to VG- even before they had been played, their pressings are that low quality. This album is no different unfortunately, looks [...]
Manny Corchado is probably now best known for his brash boogaloo tracks “Pow Wow” and “Chicken and Booze,” which go for good money in OG, 7-inch format. Burned out on boogaloo, though, I bought this album hoping to hear some of the more interesting Latin sounds that timbales player Manny Corchado and his orchestra cooked [...]
Housed in an incredibly nice cover with a unique pre-historic Flinstone vibe (the drum, the model, the hair…), this record contains several outstanding cumbias. I thought the following cumbia (eh, or Gaita?) from this record is a nice one to post because it features a great hot-jazz guitarist who at one point goes out of [...]
I wish I knew exactly where these guys came from. I always like it when a record has you looking at the world map for cues (and when it gives you an urge to travel). Anyway, they are from one of “the islands” and what they do is way cool. And loud. Six party tracks [...]