Rating:
Genre:
Latin
Release Date: 05/11/2004
Blame our postmodern fascination with sampling, or the hubris of generations who have grown up more familiar with copies than with the originals, but at this point we've pretty near wrung all meaning out of the word
fusion. And when it comes to describing the kinds of exciting developments in
world music exemplified by nuevo
flamenco artists
Ojos de Brujo, perhaps a new metaphor is necessary. Something more organic, even geological. Yes, that's it: When listening to
Barí, the Barcelona-based group's second release, the image that fits is not that of
hip-hop,
funk,
rap, or
rumba newly melded with traditional
flamenco music, but of rock layers that an ancient and moving river lays bare. The oldest strata date for the migration from India of the Roma people, called Gypsies in Spain, mixed with North African Moors. Layered upon their oral culture, their
folk songs and sinuous dancing, a bluesy lament about the hard life of the
fulag mengu -- the Arabic phrase for "fugitive peasant" and likely origin of the word "
flamenco" -- after
Ferdinand and
Isabela made Christianity the law of the land. Next, the rural accents of those who hid in the southern hills of Andalusia, and the Afro-Caribbean rhythms learned by those who fled to the colonies. Some of these rhythms were carried back to
Ojos de Brujo vocalist
Marina Abad and drummer
Xavi Turull by Cuban musicians they've played with along the way, while others already existed in the elemental
flamenco grooves, the
rumbas and
tanguillos and
bulerías, laid down by guitarist
Ramon Giménez. On top is a contemporary urban landscape of stray bullets and bill collectors, precisely rendered by
Abad's socially conscious staccato rapping. If all of this seems like a bit of a stretch, note the traditional handclapping that punctuates the opening guitar riff, and its relation to the percussively rapped syllables that chatter like water over rocks at the album's close. Listen to the eroded consonants of
"Naita" ("Nothing"), to the fossil of a
flamenco lyric with which it begins, and how seamlessly it progresses to an outcropping of
hip-hop near its finale. Consider that the classic songs of Gypsy legend
el Camarón set to
rumba and offered as consolation to modern-day
fulag mengu as
"Ventilaor Rumba 80" invites them to dance to ancient rhythms. Or that today's dangerous streets can necessitate the ancient Moorish melodies and sorrowful mode of
"Tiempo de Soleá," while an email from a fetchingly green-eyed boy inspires the invention of the
funk-fueled
"Bulería del Ay!" You just can't pull the elements or eras apart. All of this is music is firmly grounded in
flamenco, with fusion occurring not just at a superficial level, but deep below its surface, as its oldest and most enduring process. Listeners who are as interested in where
flamenco has been as they are in where it is going will love exploring the sonorous depths of
Ojos de Brujo's
Barí.
~Jenny Gage, All Music Guide
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