Search - Bobby Valentin :: Rompecabezas

Very Good, Old Salsa Album

Felix L. Rodriguez | MADRID, Spain | 07/29/2004

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Bobby Valentín has always been regarded as one of the greatest, if not the greatest, of arrangers in Latin Music. His bass playing is also legendary.

In this album, however, those attributes are nos as finely demonstrated as in other Valentin's albums (posteriors). Still..... most of the songs are very likeable ones, and that is accomplished because of the fresh attitude Valentin's arrangement still had at that time, coupled with one of the greatest SONEROS(i.e. a singer that IMPROVISES catchy phrases in-between chorus lines), Marvin Santiago. Marvin and Bobby's still young, impetuous attitude comes across very nicely on these songs.

My favorite track is PAPEL DE PAYASO and then AMOLADOR. The first one is widely known in Puerto Rico, and I suppose though LAtin America, but not the second one. But, for me, these two tracks show best the attributes described above.

If you are going to commence collecting Valentin's albums, I would recommend first to try EL REY DEL BAJO (SUPERB arrangements, if you like powerful latin music, with horns and trumpets doing great sounds!), or LA BODA DE ELLA (full of radio hits, but this time sung by Cano Estremera, widely recognized as one of the greatest soneros in the Salsa environment), or MUSICAL SEDUCTION (some known songs, but not as many as "La Boda de Ella", but, for my money the contain the best arrangements done by Bobby, plus features Luigi Texidor on the mike, Texidor being a great sonero that mixes a lot of catchy and funny phrases with great rythm, a la Marvin).



Enjoy!"