Author: Russ Slater
View album and artist detailsArtist/band: |
Meridian Brothers |
Label: |
Bongo Joe |
Magazine Review Date: |
Aug/Sept/2020 |
Colombian society and culture is always at the core of Meridian Brothers, a conceptual tropical band led by Eblis Alvarez. On their latest he takes cumbia, its rhythm and identity, as source material, creating a reconstructed surrealised version that has just about enough of the original to be recognisable.
In its finest moments it's compelling and danceable stuff, ‘Puya del Empresario’ is a dance-floor belter dominated by a huge Eurodance synth riff (in a good way), whereas the project could be summed up by ‘Cumbia del Pichaman’, a groovy bastardisation of ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ filled with Colombian slang, creating a vivid portrait of the characters you'd find at a cumbia discoteca on a Saturday night. Elsewhere, the album veers between taut rhythms that recall early electronic music of the 70s (à la Kraftwerk or Silver Apples), and playful oft-kilter pop with Meridian's usual blend of processed extraterrestrial sounds and cartoonish vocals. These characteristics mean that this group won't be for everyone, but for anyone looking to widen their sonic palette or get inside the psyche and stereotypes of cumbia there can be few better places to start. Cumbia has entered the 21st century.
Start your journey and discover the very best music from around the world.
Subscribe