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Album Details

• Artist: King Chango
• Album: The Return of El Santo
• Label: Luaka Bop
• Year of Release: 2001
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: jpenso on 2005-04-04

King Chango is the god of music in Santeria. King Chango is also a Venezuelan band that takes elements of Caribbean music and mixes them with traditional Venezuelan music and channels them with a little Hip-Hop ad electronica to create one big jumble of musical goodness. The album starts of with "Finalmente", a good warm-up for the genre-jumping that the band uses in most of their songs. In this one song alone the band goes from from a gentle latin groove and seamlessly moves into a Hip-Hop bridge and then back to the latin groove and then takes a detour through a little Reggae all without missing a beat. "Brujeria" the third track is a fine introduction to Venezuelan Llanero music with some of the best Cuatro playing I have heard. "Best Dressed Pimp" is a musical homage to Blaxploitation that even includes samples from movies. The songwriting is really strong. The band puts together songs both in Spanish and in English which is really befitting of the bands eclectic and inviting nature. King Chango is probably one of the most fun bands to listen to especially when you are in need of a pick-me-up because their energy is infectious and their message is positive, which just makes it hard not to get into this band after just one listen. If you are looking for something fun and upbeat and just plain different pick up this CD. I am continually impressed with the ability of David Byrne's Luaka Bop label's ability to find new and exiting music acts from Latim America and King Chango does not disappoint.

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