Rolling Afro-Latin Music 2023: Reggaeton, Salsa,Bachata, Bomba, Latin Jazz, Merengue, Urbano and more Latinx

Let me check if I can find the Irv Greenbaum book to see if he had something to say about this.

Money that Palmieri allegedly owed to Averne, and the way that Averne had musicians do overdubs on Unfinished Masterpiece seem to be issues

Irv does indeed have something to say. Not sure if I can summarize right now.

Palmieri talked about Unfinished Masterpiece a little when I interviewed him for the BA podcast, but I don't recall the details offhand.

Irv talks about how temperamental Eddie could be, how he personally had to pull out all the stops to finish Unfinished Masterpiece as well doing the same to edit the centerpiece of the previous album, The Sun of Latin Music, “Un Dia Bonito,” and how both Harvey and Eddie were very stingy about giving him proper credit.

Italics tags, why are they so bad and hated.

Had to hang with wife's family this past Friday on vacation at beach and missed Jose Alberto El Canario nearby (or maybe his show got cancelled as it was outdoors and it was rainy with some thunder earlier)

Meanwhile rapper Myke Towers is touring US in October and November and got a lot of airplay in April and May for various collaborations:

To ring in the month of May, the acclaimed rapper celebrated hitting #1 on Billboard’s Latin Airplay chart thanks to smash hits: “Caramelo” with Ozuna and Karol G; “Bandido” alongside Juhn; Manuel Turizo, Rauw Alejandro, and Towers’ “La Nota”; “Bésame” with Luis Fonsi; “Mi Niña” alongside Los Legendarios and Wisin; power collaboration “Travesuras”; and “Pareja Del Año” alongside Sebastian Yatra. In April, Towers joined forces with reggaeton pioneer, Daddy Yankee, for the momentous release of “Gasolina” (Safari Riot Remix) – a new remix of his 2004 global hit song, “Gasolina.” The remix is part of the original motion picture soundtrack to the new chapter in the Fast & Furious Saga, Fast X.

Bad Bunny in Rolling Stone cover story on what he’s listening to:

“I’ve been listening to Luis Miguel a lot,” he says, referring to the famous mariachi and bolero balladeer. He lists off a few more Mexican acts that have been blowing up lately: Grupo Frontera, Peso Pluma, Eslabon Armado. There’s a range of genres, too: “Radiohead,” he says, name-checking albums like OK Computer and In Rainbows. “Phob …” He trips over the name slightly. “Phoebe Bridgers?”

“Whether I’m at home or with the guys, we listen to everything: reggaeton, trap, bachata, salsa, música Mexicana, banda, regional, corridos tumbados,” he says. He sees a newer generation of artists as constant motivators: “I see them tearing it up, and it makes me want to tear it up even harder.

Salsa singer Victor Manuelle anniversary tour coming to DC area this weekend.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/tainy-producer-new-album-reggaeton-bad-bunny-ai-1234776008/

Reggaeton producer Tainey on the genre plus non-reggaeton artists he is working with including Four Tet and uh Skrillex

Tainy ( my phone’s spelling error)

Just saw a picture of Fruko on a wall.

Guess he’s appearing next week.

I saw Joe Arroyo do a good solo show years ago. He had previously sang in Fruko y sus tesos. I never saw that Colombian band though.

https://festival.si.edu/event/memorias-de-agua

Forgot to post this earlier. Streaming live now and hopefully archived is Puerto Rican bomba music from Bombaya and Cuban Orisha sounds and more from Bobi Cespedes and group at the Smithsonian Folklife Fest

Fruko tribute in my neighborhood on Thursday.

You should go

Totallly plan to, especially since the band has some aces and the singer, who sang with Fruko, seems to still have it, according to this video from several years ago.

Also primed the pump for myself by doing a salsa song last night there at karaoke.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rcblg8AKBdA

I guess that's his son who will be playing timbales on the gig.

Really excited about this

OMG they are starting with “Oye Como Va.”

Maybe that was just for soundcheck

First set was awesome although I don’t know well these paper napkin earphones are protecting my hearing.

They are playing Hector Lavoe’s greatest hits over the sound system during the break.

Had to sit outside the second set to avoid hearing problems. Then this morning my neighbor told me his girlfriend couldn’t hear for a week after a loud salsa show, which is apparently the norm, volume-wise.

The new Tego Calderón song is really good, but why does he look 75 in the video? He's my age!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGRxyz2W2Og

I like that song too

Saw Natalia Lafourcade at Wolftrap last night. Really beautiful show.

Nice. Was busy with family and couldn't make it. She did a good gig years ago at the now gone Rock n Roll Hotel in DC that I saw

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/08/04/chihuahua-mexico-misogynistic-music/

“a bandage measure that does not get at the root of misogyny …”

https://remezcla.com/music/karol-g-drops-new-album-manana-sera-bonito-bichota-season-peso-pluma-young-miko/

Karol G new album

We Like It Like That: The Story of Latin Boogaloo (2015) + a conversation with filmmaker Mathew Ramírez Warren.

Don’t remember seeing that doc and missed the Ned S zoom talk last night

Need to listen more to Karol G new album

Ned S*blette is excited about--

Music in NYC: Miguel Zenón + Luis Perdomo, Joe's Pub, Aug. 24, 9:30 p.m. I never miss an opportunity to hear these two masters play together. This is the launch event for their El Arte del Bolero Vol. 2 duo album.

Plus he just saw Ruben Blades uptown at the United Palace at 175th street ---
Rubén's voice is intact at the age of 75. At this NYC stop on his tour, he sang full voice for two and a half hours over the Roberto Delgado Big Band without taking so much as a sip of water that I could see, or leaving the stage, or bringing on any duet partners.

It was great to be able to hear this concert uptown. Most Spanish-speaking countries were in the house (there's always a roll call), and the audience knew seemingly all the catalog, singing along even with "Amor y Control" (1992). The penultimate tune of the night, his superhit "Pedro Navaja," a Threepenny Opera takeoff from the blockbuster Siembra album with Willie Colón in 1978, is a movie's worth of short story that's my favorite model of how to get a lyric to arrive at a perfect coro. If you know Latin music at all you know la vida te da sorpresas, sorpresas te da la vida, ay dios . . . He also sang "Mack the Knife" -- did I imagine this? no, he really did -- in his own English version. He kept the audience on a tight leash, announcing up front that there would be no encore, and on two occasions reprimanding people who shouted out the names of hits while he was talking.

The concert closed with his 1988 "Patria"

The one song I heard streaming from the new Zenon and Perdomo was really nice pleasant jazz. They are covering fave songs from new and old Spanish speaking artists and uh doing that .

I am liking the poppier songs on the Karol G album better than the more reggaeton ones

Seeing hype for Dominican producer / artist Diego Raposo but haven’t listened to new album yet

My Sunday night old school radio listening was nice as always. WPFW has a mambo show from 6 to 8 and a salsa dura 70s onward show from 8 to 10 eastern time

Cool!

i'm going to check that out!

WPFW shows are also archived on their website for 2 weeks. Worth checking out those 2 Sunday night shows.

ty

Listed as Latin Flavor Classic edition DJ Jim Byers

Latin Flavor Pa’lante edition DJ Daniel del Pielago

https://wpfwfm.org/radio/programming/schedule-grid

pretty into these guys recently

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxcav4kIByo

i realize that white hipsters doing vintage cumbia might not exactly fit but w/e

cumbia is definitely a white hipster thing these days but yeah it can still sound good

While listening to multiple versions of the reggae song "No, No, No," I came across a group called Boogaloo Assassins, who were a similarly retro-minded thing (I guess I'd compare them to the Dap-Kings, but for 1960s boogaloo/Latin soul) about 10 years ago. Not sure if they're still around:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEZUMEOvlvo

Here's a performance from 2017:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlHVtjgTuOU