Play Sample

Charanga Cakewalk and Michael Ramos follow up their critically acclaimed debut album Loteria De La Cumbia Lounge with the new and exciting sounds of Chicano Zen.

With its unique fusion of cumbia, bolero, dance and cinematic sounds, and featuring guest stars Lila Downs, Patty Griffin, Martha Gonzalez (of Quetzal) and Ruben Ramos, Charanga Cakewalk once again delivers an album full of charm-filled music.

Review:

Chicano Zen

Amazon.com Editorial Reviews by Christina Roden

Austin-based Miguel Ramos has created one of the most incongruous chill grooves ever. Who could have imagined that cumbia, merengue, Tejano and even flamenco-from-afar, when tossed with Caribbean rhythms plus electronica and beats, could still burn, but like dry ice? Traditional instruments like accordion, Celso Duarte's glorious harp, and Max Baca's baja sexto (twelve-string bass), plus other plucked strings and assorted shakers merge with Spanish-language vocals, the latter provided by Mexican superstar Lila Downs, Ruben "El Gato Negro" Ramos, folk-rocker Patty Griffin, Martha Gonzalez from the group Quetzal, and Texas singer-songwriter Davíd Garza. But these are underpinned by subtle drum 'n' bass and assorted lounge interpolations. Although sufficiently hip to enchant the most exacting club denizen, the tunes retain a festive playfulness and defiantly un-cool degree of passion; only in Brazil have such wildly disparate elements been so successfully fused with no loss of integrity on either side. The subject matter ranges from Morricone-laced memories of childhood cinema excursions, to a Lawrence-Welk-like polka tribute to the bandleader's mother, to an elegy for a deceased victim of police brutality, but the album flows like a hallucinatory, edgy-cozy tone poem.

Product SKU: TR-82072-CHICAN