Very Hard To Find!!!! 1st LP by Ruben Blades!

Web Review:

While still a law student in Panama, Rubén visited New York in 1970 thanks to a $20 flight obtained from a brother who worked for an airline. There, he managed to hook-up with bandleader Pete "Boogaloo" Rodríguez, to make his New York album debut for the Alegre label (which Fania absorbed in the mid-1970s). Rodríguez's biggest claim to fame is the 1966 boogaloo hit "I Like It Like That". A song which enjoyed renewed success in the 1990s in cover versions by the Blackout Allstars and Tito Nieves.

Rodríguez had this to say about the 22 year old Blades in his liner notes to "From Panama To New York" Rubén is a highly strung and adventurous boy who writes his own songs and plays guitar with such ultramodern chords, that after hearing him just once, I felt totally satisfied to work on the arrangements right away. And that same week, the album was recorded." As Rodríguez said, "that soon this young boy, who came from Panama to New York, will become one of your favourites," turned out to be prophetic.

From A Ruben Blades Interview:

"Pancho Cristal saw me in Panamá, and he talked about maybe doing something in New York so I hooked it up when I came here and I recorded in 1969 my first album with Pete Rodriguez. Pete Rodriguez was the boogaloo guy. Not Pete El Conde. We did all the charts in, like, two weeks. Lino from La Sonora Matancera did a couple of charts, God bless him. I recorded that album and then I returned to Panamá. The university was reopened and I went back to the university. This is important to clarify, because a lot of people don't understand that I came in '69 and then went back to Panamá to finish school. So that when I came to New York again, it was, I'm not too sure right now, but it was '74 or '75. I went to Miami in '74 and then I came to New York, I think, at the end of '74."

  Song titles include:

Side 1:
Juan Gonzalez
Solo
Hey Man
When
Descarga Caliente

Side 2
El Bravo
Donde
El Pescador
Amanecer
De Panama A Nueva York

 Musicians include:


THIS IS ANOTHER CLASSIC ORIGINAL IN NM CONDITIONS!!
Watch for other 257 LPs just found!! (Ebay: CAF1942)

What Is Latin Soul/Salsa??

Salsa music is a broad term that is used with various meanings depending on the context; its exact meaning is the subject of arguments among aficionados. Author Ed Morales has said the obvious, most common perception of salsa is an "extravagant, clave-driven, Afro-Cuban-derived songs anchored by piano, horns, and rhythm section and sung by a velvety voiced crooner in a sharkskin suit". He also defines it as "nothing more than a new spin on the traditional rhythms of Cuban music" and "at once (both) a modern marketing concept and the cultural voice of a new generation", representative of a "crystallization of a Latino identity (mostly Puertorricans) in New York in the early 1960s". Peter Manuel also recognizes the commercial and cultural dichotomy to salsa, noting that the term's broad use for many styles of Latin pop music has served the development of "pan-Latin solidarity", while also noting that the "recycling of Cuban music under an artificial, obscurantist label is but one more example of North American exploitation and commodification of third world primary products; for Latinos, salsa bridges the gap between "tradition and modernity, between the impoverished homeland and the dominant United States, between street life and the chic night club, and between grassroots culture and the corporate media".

The singer Rubén Blades once claimed that salsa is merely "a concept", as opposed to a definite style or rhythm. Some musicians are doubtful that the term salsa has any useful meaning at all, with the bandleader Machito claiming that salsa was more or less what he had been playing for forty years before the style was invented, while Tito Puente once responded to a question about salsa by saying "I'm a musician, not a cook" (referring to salsa's original use to mean sauce). Celia Cruz, a well-known salsa singer, has said "(s)alsa is Cuban music with another name. It's mambo, chachachá, rumba, son... all the Cuban rhythms under one name" .