There's a Fire Down Below

Back from a nice break off. Thanks for all the Happy Birthday wishes. I ended up having a nice relaxing day consisting of record store shopping, Mexican food, and plenty of tasty drinks. Anyways, I always find this time of the year becomes quite hectic with the upcoming holidays and New Year. It's probably about time I start paying tribute to some of my favorite releases of 2009. After looking back on this year I found that I got really into funky world music thanks to labels like Soundway, Strut, and Honest Jon's among others. I found myself trying to constantly crossover rare African, Latin, or Caribbean music with funky disco gems. This whole process has been quite challenging, yet very refreshing and exciting, not to mention still a work in progress. Regardless, one of the new of the many compilations I found myself enjoying this year was Soundway's Panama! 3 release. This compilation focused on Calypso Panameño, Guajira Jazz and Cumbia Típica on the Isthmus from 1960–75. Now many of those music genres sounded very foreign to me, therefore the way I would break it down is describing it as rare tropical Latin jazz-funk (if that helps simplify it at all?). I found myself constantly putting this record on and trying to dissect each and every track. I'm not going to go into each and every song that moved me, as there were many, however I will just say that I recommend everyone giving it a listen and a chance. It might not be disco, however it's definitely funky and if you can somehow successfully work a song or two from a compilation like this in a disco set I think it could be powerful. Anyways, Enjoy!

Lord Panama & The Stickers - Fire Down Below