The Rough Guide to Latin Disco

This is hardly the first compilation to highlight the Latino love affair with disco, but it's a hugely enjoyable romp nonetheless. Even aficionados might not be familiar with Colombian Wganda Kenya's deliciously cheesy instrumental take on ‘Kung-Fu Fighting’, entitled ‘Combate a Kung Fu’.

But it's the mighty Salsoul Records – the Latino-run label behind the likes of Joe Bataan, Candido and their own Salsoul Orchestra – who really set the bar on this compilation. If the original disco strings of ‘Salsoul Hustle’ don’t fill your heart with gay abandon, you’d better check your pulse. Cuban percussionist Candido's 1979 ‘Dancin’ & Prancin’’, works less well as a disco track, but as an influence on house music it's so ahead of its time that it could have been recorded a decade later. Meanwhile, Salsoul co-founder and former street-fighting man Bataan was presumably all too familiar with the lyrical nitty-gritty of Gil Scott-Heron's ‘The Bottle’, even if his all-instrumental version inevitably lacks the original's intensity. Pick of the nu-disco generation is Jungle Fire's ‘Firewalker’, a heavily percussive instrumental, sexed up with guitar fuzz and Afro-funk. Like much of the music here, it's so addictive you’ll be hearing it in your sleep.