La Mambanegra - El Callegüeso y Su Mala Maña

The Guardian 60

(Movimientos/Proper)

From the updated traditional songs of Choc Quib Town to the electro-pop-folk of Bomba Estéreo, Colombian musicians have specialised in cheerfully upbeat fusion, and La Mambanegra (The Black Mamba) continue the tradition. A nine-piece orchestra from Santiago de Cali, they call their style “Colombian break salsa”, a mixture of furiously energetic salsa dance songs with funk or Caribbean influences, along with R&B or jazz-edged brass and keyboard lines. It’s a rousing and entertaining style, as they show from the start with Puro Potenkem, which matches full-tilt vocals against tight brass lines, or La Compostura, in which they blend salsa with hip-hop. Elsewhere, there are stomping riffs on El Malembe and Jamaican-influenced vocals on Kool and the Mamba. But there’s classy musicianship at work behind the frenzy, as band-leader and saxophonist Jacobo Velez proves on the slower tracks, where he eases his band towards Latin jazz.