When Buenos Aires Began to Rock
Juan Mobili | Valley Cottage, NY USA | 11/16/2003
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Manal, along with Almendra, represented the first great moment of Rock and Blues in Argentina. Of course there were some important precedents like Los Gatos and Moris, among others, but Manal was different. They claimed Blues as an Argentinian experience, and made Buenos Aires, for some of us very young then, our city.
Manal, an invented word in Spanish that can be translated as "a lot of hands," reached all their fingers to the gray sky of a city catching up with the new music of the world (The Who's Tommy was just coming out, and the Stones were still bad boys) and offer their take on being young and angry and sad.
This CD contains some of their best stuff from their original recording for the independent label Mandioca, first and only of its kind in those days. You can hear songs that became hymns to us down there, like Jugo de Tomate ("If you want to be a big shot / cold tomato juice / in your veins /you will have to have" the chorus went), or Avenida Rivadavia and Casa con Diez Pinos. There are too some tunes from their second album, although this one never matched the raw energy and lovely poor production of the first.
I think that you don't need to have been born in Buenos Aires nor understand what Latin America was up to, to appreciate these songs. They are forefathers to the lo-fi / indie movement that has spawn so many great bands in the States. I have no proof but I'm sure that Vic Chesnutt would approve."
