Caracoles

前作同様、プロデューサー兼マルチ楽器奏者のヤコブ・プラッセと、名手ピアニストで作曲家・編曲家のマイケル・エクロスがプロデュース。そこに今回はエストレージャス・デル・ブエナ・ビスタ・ソシアル・クラブでツアーやレコーディングに参加する気鋭シンガー・ソングライター=キコ・ルイスが参加。オーセンティックなキューバン・ビッグバンド・スタイルを現代に再現している。

Cubas Orquesta Akokan is one of the premier mambo bands of the 21st century. Led by producer/multi-instrumentalist Jacob Plasse and virtuosic pianist, composer, and arranger Michael Eckroth, their third album, Caracoles, goes farther than its predecessors. It moves mambo in progressive directions and embraces elements of son, guaguanco, rhumba, descarga, and modern Afro-Cuban salsa and jazz. The 18-piece band was recorded live from the floor at Havanas Abdala Producciones studios. The Orquesta collaborates with journeyman Cuban lyricist, singer, and composer Kiko Ruiz, who has worked with many illustrious bands. Groove and celebration are the twin drivers of Caracoles, evidenced by its gorgeous opener "Con Licencia." Seemingly a straight-ahead mambo, its gorgeous Benny More-esque melody, call-and-response vocals, and percussion carry a classic melody, and it transcends the form by grafting mind-boggling, striated horn charts in its bridge. The title track offers a dramatic intro that recalls the one in Margarita Lecuonas "Babalu." From there it struts, swings, and grooves with syncopated rhythms and vocals from Ruiz and a chorus. Cinematic in the extreme, its replete with wonderful claves, conga, and baritone sax breakdowns. Colombian-born, New York-based bullerengue vocalist Carolina Oliveros (Combo Chimbita) joins Ruiz on "Cha-Cha-Cha," a killer mambo that wears Perez Prados influence on its sleeve. The interplay between singers is canny as piano montunos and drums frame the pair. The burning mambo-son fusion in "La Fiera" allows for intricate conversation between Ruiz, his singers, his percussionists, and the driving horn section. The show band sound of "Pregonero" weds mambo to swinging Caribbean rhythms as a bright, muted brass and a strident vocal chorus buoy Ruiz, who floats across the melodies with poetic grace. The rippling, percussive frontline in "Flor Di Mi Campo" hearkens back to mambos beginnings with its gloriously infectious romantic dance music, even when it erupts into a furious chorus of congas, Gaston Joyas bass, horns, and voices in the final third. Closer "Dona Felipa" is a seriously uptempo groover of a mambo with alto saxophonist Cesar Lopez (ex-Irakere) in call-and-response with tenor sax players Emir Santa Cruz Hernandez and Jose Luis "Chewy" Hernandez and baritone saxophonist Evaristo Denis; Ruizs percussion army soars above. Caracoles effectively resurrects an era from the early 50s to the mid-60s when More, Prado, and Machito were the kings of Afro-Latin music, playing with New York groups and Cubas orquestas gigantes. Orquesta Akokan arent merely revivalists -- they create their own 21st century jazzy, polyrhythmic innovations, proving that mambo remains relevant musically, culturally, and spiritually. ~ Thom Jurek