#11 Palo Congo by Sabu

While I did enjoy Brilliant Corners a change in musical genre is greatly appreciated. So what we have here is Palo Congo which is essentially a mish-mash of random and apparently compatible influences. Unlike the rest of the previous albums I listened to this album late at night rather than during the afternoon, the reason being that I was chilling in a park with a mate and some vanilla milkshakes. Anyway, enough about my social life and back to the album.

My first listen to this was not very successful since it actually culminated in my having a headache and having to take a few ibuprofen and lying down for half an hour before I attempted the second listen. This wasn’t helped by some random guy on the fifth track Simba who would pop up every now and then, scream like a bird and then lie and wait for the next opportunity to piss me off.

The really annoying thing about this album is that it opens with such an addictive, amazing track and it just then trails off into what sounds like a disorganised mess. It’s a real pity as El Cambanchero is a scorcher of a track who’s brilliance is just not lived up to. This is made very plain in the follower Billumba-Palo Congo where it sounds like some random old man has ambled into the recording sessions and is just shouting things at the players in some strange call-response ritual.

This is clearly just me not being able to cope with the sheer multitude of what is going in on in some of the tracks as suddenly you get to tracks like Asabache which is rather simple and features some absolutely astounding percussive work. But then this is followed by the headache inducing Simba where the crazed howls just form a black cloud over the rest of an album that is far stronger in it’s absence.

The rating that I give is very low mainly due to the excruciating headache that one or two of the tracks gave me. However, I decided that a second rating is in order just to show how much this one duff track takes away from the rest.

4.0/10 (5.5 if Simba was excluded)


El Cambanchero
Asabache
Rhapsodia Del Maravilloso
Aggo Elegua