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If anyone were to ask me who my favourite salsa group was, I could
take the easy way out and say… well, there are so many groups
and styles…it depends…umm. At the very least you would
expect me to search through piles of Cuban records or some of
the very best Puerto Rican ones. In the late 80’s I picked
up two vinyl LPs by Venezuelan conjunto Guaco and put them at
the top of the salsa tree. This was at a time when Cuban salsa
was almost unknown outside Cuba even though we secretly knew where
the music came from….montuno….afro-cuban beats. It
doesn’t take a genius. Guaco are an intergenerational group
and have been around for more than 30 years. They started out
as a folkloric group performing on the streets of Maracaibo. Since
then the band has evolved into the one of the greatest tropical
orchestras of all time.
To my mind the music offered on this 2000 release,
Equilibrio is a stunning example of what Guaco is all about….firmly
Latin, imbued with a Venezuelan spirit, superbly composed melodies
and arrangements that are as tight as a pin and rhythms that swirl
out in polyphonic stacks. They’ve perfected a devastating
modus operandi where the music moves through a series musical
and rhythmical archetypes that gravitate from the song, whether
it be a ballad or swinging salsa to accommodate elements of funk,
rap, Cuban, jazz, in your face rock elements, as well as pushing
the bubbling stew with Venezuelan gaita and joropo rhythms in
a wall of delirious sound. These moments, which I like to call
guaco-beat are the central orgiastic scenes in a driving passion
play of sweetness (introduction), salsa, (foreplay)… then
bang…Guaco-beat.
Only the excellent pop ballad Si Las Paredes
Hablaran keeps the temperature a bit more even. In fact for such
a powerful piece of latin dance music there are lots of lovely
little ditties on Equilibrio that dally with the heartstrings
before shifting gears. One of several examples is La Culpable
that features the superb mid-tempo salsa-ballad style of original
vocalist Gustavo Aguado moaning about some treacherous woman.
Not for long though because, even though the lyrics continue in
the self-pitying tone up to the final lloraras en silencio (you’ll
cry in silence) Guaco have got other ideas. Gustavo does a Houdini
on Bailaora which is a driving funk number in complete consonance
with the Guaco sound. In fact few tropical groups in the history
of the music keep the rhythms pumping so furiously yet so playfully
with a firm grasp of when to hold back and when to apply multiple
coup de graces. In the world of tropical music and of people whose
hips are linked to their minds, it’s called FUN.
Jorge Luis Chacin, one of three wonderful singers
here is simply one of the most exciting tropical vocalists around,
crooning rapturously when demanded and exhorting with improvisatory
abandon when the beats start flying. He is the most featured on
the 11 songs. Just listen to him on Solo Con Sus Recuerdos which
accelerates to a hyperkinetic catharsis of afro-beat-salsa bathed
with swathes of guitar noise and an outrageous high-pitched vocal
funk parody plopped firmly on top. If it wasn’t Guaco it
would go into the garbage bin. I’m at a loss to explain
how it works so brilliantly, except of course to note the musicians
are masters at fearlessly juggling seemingly contradictory elements
while keeping the dance juices flowing.
Jorge is also heard on the excellently sung
schmaltzy ballad Una Estrella Como Tu which then pulls you on
the dance floor with salsa before pulling out the heavier artillery.
The one non-original number here, a powerful deconstruction of
the Cuban classic, Arsenio Rodriguez’s Fuego En El 23 also
has Jorge’s exhorting tones, a rich soprano which simply
soars on the closer, the jazzy title track Equilibrio where a
rolling piano solo brought me to the realisation that there are
no other solos on the record. And the alarming conclusion that
you don’t miss them. I’ve omitted describing a few
numbers. In fact I sort of started talking about the tracks at
random. It is suffice to say that they’re great, that this
is a Latin dance record with few equals and that the Cuban and
New York crowd can scratch their collective heads as much as they
like.
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