Rumor is that they’re stopping all salsa ingredients at the US/Mexico border, looking for Sam and Ella, the infamous outlaw duo causing more gut-wrenching havoc than anyone since Bonnie & Clyde. Apparently Sam and Ella like lots of fresh salsa, though it’s uncertain whether they actually prefer the tomatoes, the peppers, the onions, or the cilantro. Don’t forget the tortillas. Sounds like my kind of folk. Who cares if they’re a pain in the butt? Who’s not? Just as long as there’s no embargo on drums, brass, or guitars we’ll all survive.
With Esai Morales presiding, things got off to a saucey (sassy?) enough start at McArthur Park’s July 3 opening concert of the season. It’s everything that Memorial Park in Pasadena is not- dirty, smelly, and… full of people! There are people playing soccer, people having picnics, and people just relaxing. It’s in the heart of LA’s Central American barrio, you see, and it looks it, with pupuserias, tortillas veloces, the whole shebang. Before the concert began, there was even a little Central American sideshow party going on, with buffet and a marimba band playing the kind of cutesy Latino pop that they like down there. Guatemala was my first point of expatriation in life, but I can’t say I ever appreciated the music there very much, though there are possibilities. One of those possibilities is the Garifuna, who occupy a little crotch-shaped piece of the continent where Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras all meet, and who have achieved some fame, such as it is, in world music circles with the ascent of the late Andy Palacio of Belize and his album Watina, and to a lesser extent Aurelio Martinez of Honduras.
Punta Cartel opened the show, billed as Reggaeton in some blurbs and Garifuna in others, though in reality I think the correct term is ‘punta rock.’ That’s probably honest, since they’re probably looking for an identity as well as a sales pitch. I’m not sure what country they’re from, Honduras I think, since they all spoke fluent English as well as Spanish while invoking the names of all the Central American countries, though Garifunas are certainly not native to El Salvador. I heard no Garifuna spoken, an Arawakan-based language, though the people look more African than anything else, escaped slaves who inter-bred with the local Indians not unlike what happened in Florida. I suspect these guys are as much Caribbean Blacks as they are Black Caribs, as Garifunas were formerly mistakenly called, but I suppose the question is academic. There are all levels of involvement with any traditional culture. How many Native Americans actually speak a native language? Only the diehards do, my friends, only the diehards. Anyway the music was lively enough, if a bit frenetic at first. The opening number was almost un-listenable for me, all percussion and no direction, but by the second song they settled into a comfortable cumbia-style groove and pretty much stayed there for the rest of the set, only occasionally deviating for a Bob Marley tune or some other reggae-style number.
Son Mayor came on next to wide applause, probably as much for the sexy lead singer Juliana Munoz as anything else, strictly old school femme fatale with high heels and short skirt primping and strutting- imagine Salma Hayek in drag- but she can sing. The whole band is as tight as a drum with no weak spots. There are twelve members complete with multiple horns and percussions and some rocking good piano. In other words these guys kicked proverbial butt, playing no nonsense straight-ahead salsa of the highest order, and the dance floor (grass field actually) was full. If there was any weak spot it was only perhaps in the overly dramatic gyrations of Munoz, threatening to make a caricature of herself in that little Xena-does-the-asphalt-jungle skirt, scant cover riding high up muscled thighs, loose top drooping low over fleshy mounds of fetching endearment (excuse me a moment…) Okay, I’m better now, but don’t forget to catch Son Mayor sometime. They play all over the LA area.
Another salsa band named Rumbankete, a portmanteau I assume meaning ‘wall of rumba’ or something like that, played the LACMA (LA County Museum of Art) outdoors on Saturday. What a difference the venue makes! This makes Pasadena look like the barrio! In other words this is salsa for Anglos, though that doesn’t necessarily mean ‘salsa lite.’ Billing themselves as ‘LA’s newest salsa band,’ I reckon I can cut them some slack. They had some trouble with three-part harmonies, but did fine with simple lead and back-up. They had no problem with three-part trombones. That’s their strong point. This is a trombone lover’s band. They too played some pretty full-on straight-ahead salsa, but without a proper stage and sound system it just didn’t sound as good as Son Mayor. There’s something to be said for twenty years’ experience, and then there’s that sexy lead singer providing a visual focus… Give them a little time to tighten up. They’ve got gigs at El Floridita up here in Hollywood.
This week Macarthur Park is looking like the hot ticket again, with Very Be Careful- weird name (do Latinos study English in Thailand?), but good tunes; ADAAWE- female African percussion; and Yari More y su orquesta- hot sizzling salsa again, from Wednesday through Friday respectively. They’ve even got the jazz piano phenomenon Eldar Djangirov on Saturday, but I may be elsewhere, like the Rachid Taha show at Cal Plaza, a Paris-based Arab of long renown. Son de Madera, a son Jarocho band, is at Cal Plaza downtown on Friday evening and also at Macarthur next week. INCENDIO, guitar fusion, and Jessica Fichot, folk gypsy jazz, are at the Levitt in Pasadena and LACMA has their ongoing Friday and Saturday evenings of Jazz and Latin (at 6 and 5pm respectively), this week featuring Grant Geissman and Imaginacion. Then there’s Banda Brothers next Tuesday at Hollywood and Highland. There are regular shows out at Santa Monica Pier, Borders and Amoeba Records, Griffith Observatory, Getty Center and Autrey Center also, most for free, but they’re not all world music. Latin and jazz overlap so much here and in New York that I’ll mention the jazz too when convenient. They need all the help they can get to show people there’s a genuine Black American musical art form that’s fun, highly skilled… and not hip-hop.
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