Showing posts with label Bolivia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bolivia. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 20, 2023

Wara ~ Bolivia


El Inca (1973)

Wara's debut represents a very crude early progressive rock attempt coming from a third world country. Heck, really a fourth world country during this time. The production is very rough, at least the copy I have, with muddled bass and warbly sounds. The music is a mix of hard rock and prog, not an uncommon sound for the region. Similar to groups such as Tarkus (Peru), Modulo 1000 (Brazil), and Psiglo (Uruguay). Nice organ, guitar, and high pitched vocals in Spanish. If you have a tolerance for rough demo sounding recordings, then the music of El Inca will interest you. If looking for pitch perfect and professional progressive rock, steer well clear of this title. I enjoy the pioneering spirit and creative imagination applied. It's not always a pleasant listen, but I really appreciate the effort made.

Originals are impossibly rare and likely to be covered in mud for the few that survived. When I worked for a global higher education company, one of my project managers was originally from Bolivia. A couple of times she would go back there to visit family, and I asked her to inquire about this album. She received blank stares haha. They knew the group, not the album. Worth a try I figured...

Ownership: Revista Arte & Rock (CD) 

My database shows I purchased this in 2002, which makes Discogs' date incorrect. I made that note on Discogs seven years ago, but no one followed my lead. Now that I look closer, my version is a bit different and not in Discogs, so their version would be a second press. Likely to be an unauthorized release in any case, and Discogs has labeled it as such. Shoot, I could have sworn I heard someone bump into the turntable during the recording lol. However I suspect that all of the reissues are similar, as none of the labels show proper provenance. 

Just getting word that Guerssen of Spain will be reissuing this album legit in Oct of 2023.

2002 (first listen); 11/15/17; 9/20/23 (review / new entry)

Thursday, November 29, 2018

2018 Journal #7: Michel Madore, Bayete, Cesar Ascarrunz, AnVision

Michel Madore - La Chambre Nuptiale. 1978 Canada

Instrumental electronic album. A bit static on the whole. Never been reissued.

Bayete - Worlds Around the Sun. 1972 USA

Bayete, Todd Cochran by any other name, is a highly praised jazz release, but I don't hear anything overly special myself. It's... jazz. Good but nothing more.

Cesar Ascarrunz - Cesar 830. 1975 Bolivia

Has a couple of great songs, along the lines of Santana ('See Saw Affair' and 'Gotta Get Away'), but mostly this is fairly typical of the region. I had such high hopes for this title originally.

Anvision - Astralphase. 2012 Poland

Despite purporting the album to be more progressive rock oriented, along the lines of Eloy, this album proved to be somewhat generic prog metal. It's good though.

Chango ~ USA ~ New York City, New York

Honey Is Sweeter Than Blood (1976) I don't think I've heard this album since first acquiring it some 25 years ago. After scoring a c...