Various Artists - Chicano Power - Latin Rock In The USA 1968-1976(1998)Soul Jazz - Rare Latin/Soul/Funk/Jazz(FLAC)+++Full Artwork

Dont be Misled by the title....This brilliant Double CD has nothing whatsoever to do with Rock music. These two CDs contain 17 tracks by latin bands throughout the USA who fused Soul,Funk, & Jazz, and Latin Music in the late 1960s and 1970s. Mexican-American bands from Los Angeles and San Francisco are well represented on the set, it also includes Puerto Rican-American artists and groups from New York and Miami. There are also a couple cuts from the Peruvian band black sugar, included to illustrate the influence of US latin rock in latin america itself. at any rate, it's a great collection of a genres that, other than the hit records by santana of course, is largely overlooked by mainstream latin history and poorly represented on reissues. many tracks are now very Obscure & hard to obtain. cuts like black sugar's "viajecito," for instance, could fit well on a salsa radio station but for the obvious touches of contemporary music, usually in the guitar. in "viajecito," for example, there's a wild "shaft" like psychedelic guitar that runs through the entirety of what otherwise is a fairly standard latin pop-jazz song; tierra's "sun god" kicks off with crazy synthesizers, & the influence of Santana is felt mightily throughout, like miami's the Antiques, whose "chauca" is like early Santana,  and a real highlight of the collection. the santana comparisons are not always coincidental is Carlos Santana's brother Jorge Santana played guitar in Band Malo, and onetime santana member Coke Escovedo founded Azteca. at its best, this collection, like early santana, is an intoxicating mix of latin Based Soul/Funk/R&B/Psychedelia/& Jazz. Santana themselves are represented by the song that's probably the apex of the whole musical movement, "soul sacrifice." there's a 40-page booklet with information on the groups and the sociopolitical factors that gave birth to the style. Barrio Nuevo collects party tracks showing how Latin music has influenced the world and been influenced by black American music.

AMM

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                                                                  Artists & Tracks Below(FLAC)