Bajofondo Tango Club - Various Artists

The Bajofondo Tango Club, self-titled album is a range of south-american styles and instruments from the uruguay and argentina area. This music adds a whole new, contemporary twist to the Latin-america genre with better technology and a more energetic focus.

Often compared to the more European/Parisian sounding Gotan, the band were a part of Electrotango revolution that brought the failing tango scene back into the public eye. The ...
...underworld or underground,) which even better reflects their newly expanded repertoire, now including some down-beat/trip-hop, club, chill out and elements of house style music.

This album is something almost totally different to anything I personally had heard before. So different, in fact, i had to hear them for the first time in spain.
But was i was immediatley mesmerized by not only the unique style of the music but of the ... more

The Bajofondo Tango Club, self-titled album is a range of south-american styles and instruments from the uruguay and argentina area. This music adds a whole new, contemporary twist to the Latin-america genre with better technology and a more energetic focus.

Often compared to the more European/Parisian sounding Gotan, the band were a part of Electrotango revolution that brought the failing tango scene back into the public eye. The band have recently edited their name to simply Bajofondo (meaning underworld or underground,) which even better reflects their newly expanded repertoire, now including some down-beat/trip-hop, club, chill out and elements of house style music.

This album is something almost totally different to anything I personally had heard before. So different, in fact, i had to hear them for the first time in spain.
But was i was immediatley mesmerized by not only the unique style of the music but of the various, sometimes unconventional instruments blended beautifully with some new age techniques. This music is no generic pop-chart nonsense, the (some live and some sampled) singing illustrate a uncommon passion to the work while leaving mystery as to the subject with foreign languages.

Certain tracks in particualr may already be in your subconcious, with track 1, Montserrat and track 4, Mi Corazon having already been used in television advertisements, but these are not even my personal favourites.
Track 12, Forma, with a short, but immedietly arresting piano riff backed by what sounds like electronic trance/trip-hop exudes an almost summer-like feeling. Track 7, Esperandote, mixes a modern, almost trance inducing upbeat backing beat twith the sounds of ye-olde style singing.

Certain other tracks however, did not leave me so enchanted, such as track 2, En Mi/Soledad. While seeming to have pretty much all of the same basic ingredients as all the other songs on the album, fails to display that special spark that make the other tracks so good.
While Track 5, Maroma, seems to spin wildly from up to date bass beats and electronica to classic style bandoneon, leaving a raw feeling of confusion and is generally neither relaxing or entertaining.

This is a sharp contrast to track 6, Perfume, which manages to use the same mix of contemporary electronic beats with the same bandoneon sound to create something with a much stronger feeling of passion and excitement.

Some excellent work pretty much all round, id recommend to either music lovers seeking something different to most modern music, or to previous internatial music lovers. Definitely worth the purchase. 

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