This first article on this page might be of interest for folks wanting more
Ai, rumba!! Allow me to digress.
Rumba in its various forms is / are kind of folkloric root and base of Cuban music. This right here is guaguanco, one of the three traditional rumba styles, and the one most commonly still performed, played here in pretty much it's traditional form.
Another guaguanco, with the great Orlando "Puntilla" Rios, grand old man of the Cuban / New York rumbero community. The clave is easier to hear here, it's more even eighth notes, where the more traditional players tend to elide the difference between a duple and triple time feel. This is *rumba* clave, a little different to the "Bo Diddley" "shave and a haircut" clave - called *son* clave - shown in the reggaeton in two minutes clip.
This is one of my favorite videos in the world. When they break into the call-and-response thing at about 4:30 and the dancers get up the joy of it all is palpable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnBN_AXfkvk
Salsa is more of a popular, dance club style, mostly based out of New York. Here is the great Ruben Blades performing "Pedro Navaja", which is basically the Spanish version of "Mack the Knife". This has son clave, which you can hear pretty clearly at the beginning of the tune.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCC-zWQfdI
Clave is the key (literally) to a really broad range of musical styles and traditions of the Spanish-speaking African diaspora. It's one of many similar rhythmic patterns found in Africa, all of which turn out to be Euclidean rhythms, which I will not get into because we'll be here all night.
I pretty much love Latin music.
2025-10-17 23:59:24
MAGAs do not want to share the world with anyone else. Not sharing is the point of the movement
They are in for a big disappointment, because the rest of the world isn't going away. And it's true, they're trying to make the US their own private homogenous playground, but there are too many other kinds of people here already. A lot of us were born here.
A lot of the brown Spanish speaking people were here before this country was.
I don't know what it's gonna take for these fuckers to get it through their heads that white skin and blue eyes just ain't that big of a deal.
2025-10-17 20:03:34
Hey, that's actually a really good breakdown of reggaeton. Clear and succint and accurate.
I am completely ignorant of Bad Bunny's work because (a) rap leaves me behind because I have a hearing impairment that makes it basically impossible for me to make out lyrics in recorded music, and (b) reggaeton drives me nuts - it's not just that it's repetitive, the repeating cell is so small that there is no (to my ear) breathing room.
Plus I live near a couple of large Latin communities and the way I hear reggaeton is typically being cranked from some guy's car at a volume level that makes the doors of my car vibrate from the massive bass. I want to take those guys aside and say "You're gonna be stone deaf by the time you're 40" but I'm more than sure they wouldn't care. They're having fun now, 40 is a long way off.
I miss salsa. At least that gives you both sides of the clave.
All of that said, BB seems like a very interest artist and social and cultural persona. I'm not a sports guy and will likely not watch the Super Bowl, but I'm both amused and delighted that he was the NFL's pick for the half time show.
In my wildest dreams I would never have predicted the NFL as a socially forward-looking organization. I suspect they know who their viewing audience is.
MAGAs just gonna have to learn to share the world with everybody else.
Absolutely
This first article on this page might be of interest for folks wanting more
Ai, rumba!! Allow me to digress.
Rumba in its various forms is / are kind of folkloric root and base of Cuban music. This right here is guaguanco, one of the three traditional rumba styles, and the one most commonly still performed, played here in pretty much it's traditional form.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOQvzI1A2P0
Another guaguanco, with the great Orlando "Puntilla" Rios, grand old man of the Cuban / New York rumbero community. The clave is easier to hear here, it's more even eighth notes, where the more traditional players tend to elide the difference between a duple and triple time feel. This is *rumba* clave, a little different to the "Bo Diddley" "shave and a haircut" clave - called *son* clave - shown in the reggaeton in two minutes clip.
This is one of my favorite videos in the world. When they break into the call-and-response thing at about 4:30 and the dancers get up the joy of it all is palpable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnBN_AXfkvk
Salsa is more of a popular, dance club style, mostly based out of New York. Here is the great Ruben Blades performing "Pedro Navaja", which is basically the Spanish version of "Mack the Knife". This has son clave, which you can hear pretty clearly at the beginning of the tune.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCC-zWQfdI
Clave is the key (literally) to a really broad range of musical styles and traditions of the Spanish-speaking African diaspora. It's one of many similar rhythmic patterns found in Africa, all of which turn out to be Euclidean rhythms, which I will not get into because we'll be here all night.
I pretty much love Latin music.
MAGAs do not want to share the world with anyone else. Not sharing is the point of the movement
They are in for a big disappointment, because the rest of the world isn't going away. And it's true, they're trying to make the US their own private homogenous playground, but there are too many other kinds of people here already. A lot of us were born here.
A lot of the brown Spanish speaking people were here before this country was.
I don't know what it's gonna take for these fuckers to get it through their heads that white skin and blue eyes just ain't that big of a deal.
Hey, that's actually a really good breakdown of reggaeton. Clear and succint and accurate.
I am completely ignorant of Bad Bunny's work because (a) rap leaves me behind because I have a hearing impairment that makes it basically impossible for me to make out lyrics in recorded music, and (b) reggaeton drives me nuts - it's not just that it's repetitive, the repeating cell is so small that there is no (to my ear) breathing room.
Plus I live near a couple of large Latin communities and the way I hear reggaeton is typically being cranked from some guy's car at a volume level that makes the doors of my car vibrate from the massive bass. I want to take those guys aside and say "You're gonna be stone deaf by the time you're 40" but I'm more than sure they wouldn't care. They're having fun now, 40 is a long way off.
I miss salsa. At least that gives you both sides of the clave.
All of that said, BB seems like a very interest artist and social and cultural persona. I'm not a sports guy and will likely not watch the Super Bowl, but I'm both amused and delighted that he was the NFL's pick for the half time show.
In my wildest dreams I would never have predicted the NFL as a socially forward-looking organization. I suspect they know who their viewing audience is.
MAGAs just gonna have to learn to share the world with everybody else.