Quote:
Originally Posted by Gavin B.
Song of the Day
Ibraham Ferrer of the BVSC
Chan Chan - The Buena Vista Social Club The spellbinding Cuban love song is the signature song of the BVSC. I love they way the congas play an off-time counter rhythm to the sepentine bass line of the song. The muted trumpet solo in the middle is just too cool and reminds of Miles Davis on Sketches of Spain. The plaintive vocal by Ibaham Ferrer is brilliant.
The pictures of Havana in the video make me wish the United States travel embargo against Cuba was lifted so I can visit this magnificent city was and still is the jewel of the Greater Antilles islands .
Havana is the last of the old provincial capital cities of the Caribbean that hasn't be touched by the tentacles of global capitalism. The scenes along of the topaz blue ocean at high tide crashing against the seawall in Havana are breathtaking.
The fact that every automobile in Cuba predates the 1959 trade embargo makes the Havana seem like a dreamy surreal city untouched by the passage of time. Note the city bus in the video is an old modified American designed bus shell that was mounted on the back of a large flat bed truck when the original engine of the bus finally gave out.
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Gavin B......yet again, our musical tastes coincide. I don't know if you realized this, but I also did a review over this very song a little while back. I absolutely loved reading your own take and description. I wish I had thought of "spellbinding", because that sums the whole song up perfectly, good job. Unlike you though, I never tried to translate the lyrics. Just not knowing what they were singing about left the song in a sense of mystery that I loved. But I gave in to temptation and had to read they were saying, and I have to say I'm a little dissapointed. I also find it so bizaar that you would love to visit Cuba, because that has been the one place I have always told everyone I would love to travel to one day. There's just something about it that draws me in.