Tag: Latin Music

Crappy Album Covers #197 — Covers with some e'splainin' to do

Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III, known to some as Desi Arnaz, came to America as a humble but talented musician from Santiago, Chile, and from the early to mid-1930s, held several odd jobs, including bird cage cleaner, taxi driver, and bookkeeper. He later joined Xavier Cugat in the late ’30s, and showed his musical talents. A couple of years later, he formed his own dance orchestra, releasing several albums during the late 30s and throughout the 1940s.

His role as Ricky Ricardo from Cuba in the sitcom “I Love Lucy” featured the song Babalu in the 1951 pilot episode. He had by this time already been married to Lucille Ball in real life. As a bit of extra trivia, the entire series had always been filmed in front of a live audience.
British comedian Max Bygraves wants us to believe that this series, called “Viva! Congalongamax” survived 10 volumes, although little indication of this appears on Wikipedia. What is indicated, is that this is his tenth album with a different title. What is also indicated, beyond doubt, is his love for album titles with long almost nonsensical words such as the title “Singalongamax”, “Discolongamax”, and this one. These may be found among his 63 album titles Wikipedia says he put out.

The Discolongamax album features such dico smash hits as “Get Me to Church on Time”, “You Need Hands”, and “How Ya Gonna Keep ’em Down on the Farm?”. And of course, he sings “Feelings”.
Faceinhole.com allows its visitors to put a picture in place of Max’s on this cover.

Crappy Album Covers #168 — Sucky Latino

Album_Cover_Crap_320_Latino_Love This is Richard Hayman’s 1969 cheezily synthesized “Genuine Electric Latin Love Machine”. Hear synthesized versions of songs like “The Girl From Ipanema”, “The Windmills of Your Mind”, and “Hare Krishna”. 

Wait … “Hare Krishna” is a Latin tune? Naw! And “Windmills” isn’t exactly Latin either, come to think of it. Looks like the robot needs to be re-programmed.
Album_Cover_Crap_295_funniez_net The Pachacamac is an ancient Peruvian site, thought to be nearly 3000 years old. Legend has it that every so often, on a clear sunny day, this dark haired guy in a tank top rises up from the Lurin River nearby and sings Latin hits. 

Of course, it is only the stuff of legend, and no one knows if it’s true.

One blog has Beto Mendez’s nationality as Ecuadorian. The album was produced likely some time in the mid-1960s.

 

Crappy Album Covers #51 — The International Language of Bad Taste II

In this virtual tour, we go to what seems to be outer space’s Latin Quarter, then back to China.

album-cover-crap-42_lp-cover-lover This album, “en el espacio”, by Los 4 Amigos, is another obvious competitor to the Devo album cover lookalike contest.

We can learn a lot from pictures of aliens. As you can see, they are aliens with tiny bodies and large heads. On their planet, they seemed to have found a way of playing instruments that are merely printed on their space suits. This enables them to play while floating in deep space.

“Los 4 Amigos” appears to be a common phrase that on a Google search I got everything from restaurants to art exhibits. The group also doesn’t show up on allmusic.
album-cover-crap-43_lp-cover-lover Jalaito Sabroson and their album, “Los Ases del Ritmo”. I almost read that as “Jailbaito”. Where is my head?

Translated, this title seems to be saying “The Pace of Aces”. No info available. Probably another Latin-inspired dance record, by that title.
album-cover-crap-39_lp-cover-lover
 Red China Rocks was a band, that, by all accounts, attempted to play in China in the early 1970s. They succeeded in playing most of the way through one gig, then were immediately deported.

The Chinese shouldn’t have been so harsh. See this cover? Doesn’t Chairman Mao-Tse Tung (in this decade, I’ve seen his name commonly spelled “Mao Zedong”) look dapper, dressed for a night on the town? It is likely Mao’s head could have been pasted, Oswald-style, on someone else’s body. But clearly, the photo retouchers of this album could have done worse.
album-cover-crap-40_lp-cover-lover Here, a more conventional-looking Chairman Mao meets Richard Nixon. I have no idea what this album is about. Any Chinese translators out there? Or does someone have this album?

But I just thought you needed to see these two leaders in the same picture.One supplied arms and personnel to the South Vietnamese, while the other supplied arms and personnel to the North Vietnamese.

While it is true that Nixon was bombing the crap out of Vietnam and Cambodia, the war ended soon after Nixon left office.