Thrilling Array of Savage, Passionate Rhythm*
Original Facebook post here.
Today's formative-album replay: Tito Puente, Tambó. This is some kind of dream record—I don't just mean that it's stunning, which it is, but that it seems like the kind of record you could only imagine existed. When, during a Latin music phase in the early '90s, I came across this 1960 collection of instrumentals not just dominated by Puente's extraordinary percussion section but shaped around it, by it, for it, it was a miracle akin to discovering that there actually was a record of Kurt Weill piano-vocal demos (Tryout) or of Ella covering Randy Newman.
There aren't songs here so much as there are compositions, built on thundering or sinuous grooves and layered polyrhythms, with harmony not so much an afterthought—the contributions of brass and flutes and piano and bass, not to mention tuned percussion, are essential here—as occupying a different importance, less as an organizing principle than as another flavor, another color in the drum-led parade.
You may not think such a record could keep your interest, but this is a soundscape it's remarkably easy to get lost in, and the variety—from full-frontal assault to gentle beach breeze—is prodigious. There's another collection called Top Percussion that has some essential tracks but is only half as good overall. For me, Tambó is Tito's masterpiece; this record makes him sound like, if he hadn't spent his career as a top-notch bandleader and performer, he could have been the Astor Piazzolla of the mambo.
*This is a quote from the liner notes.
Today's formative-album replay: Tito Puente, Tambó. This is some kind of dream record—I don't just mean that it's stunning, which it is, but that it seems like the kind of record you could only imagine existed. When, during a Latin music phase in the early '90s, I came across this 1960 collection of instrumentals not just dominated by Puente's extraordinary percussion section but shaped around it, by it, for it, it was a miracle akin to discovering that there actually was a record of Kurt Weill piano-vocal demos (Tryout) or of Ella covering Randy Newman.
There aren't songs here so much as there are compositions, built on thundering or sinuous grooves and layered polyrhythms, with harmony not so much an afterthought—the contributions of brass and flutes and piano and bass, not to mention tuned percussion, are essential here—as occupying a different importance, less as an organizing principle than as another flavor, another color in the drum-led parade.
You may not think such a record could keep your interest, but this is a soundscape it's remarkably easy to get lost in, and the variety—from full-frontal assault to gentle beach breeze—is prodigious. There's another collection called Top Percussion that has some essential tracks but is only half as good overall. For me, Tambó is Tito's masterpiece; this record makes him sound like, if he hadn't spent his career as a top-notch bandleader and performer, he could have been the Astor Piazzolla of the mambo.
*This is a quote from the liner notes.
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