Willie Colón — “La María” (Official Visualizer)

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Fania presents a remastered vinyl reissue of LO MATO (SI NO COMPRA ESTE LP), one of the key Fania Records albums that sums up the ’70s salsa movement in all its trendsetting glory. Released in 1973, just as the New York salsa movement reached a creative and commercial apex, the LP marked the end of a chapter for both Colón and Lavoe. It was the final entry in a spectacular series of collaborative albums that began with 1967’s El Malo and found the duo constantly recording and touring together. Following the release of Lo Mato, Lavoe would launch his epic solo career – with Colón as producer – while the ever-prolific Willie would branch out into collaborations with Celia Cruz, Mon Rivera, Rubén Blades, and his own solo output.

The new edition of Lo Mato was mastered and cut by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio and pressed on 180-gram audiophile quality vinyl.

When they signed with the Fania label in the late ’60s, Colón and Lavoe represented to the old guard of tropical music the impending threat of a younger generation, ready to renew the salsa genre with an edgier sound. Colón consciously cultivated the persona of a dangerous bad boy through fictitious posters that portrayed him as wanted by the FBI.

Musically, Colón and Lavoe accomplished a full renewal of Afro-Caribbean music. In their hands, salsa became alternately more rugged and sophisticated: imbued in Brazilian rhythms (“La María”), reverent to the roots of Puerto-Rican folk (“Guajira ven”), ready to detour into Latin jazz (“Junio 73”), but always armed with a killer instinct for massive hits (“Calle luna calle sol.”)

Lo Mato has everything you would expect from an Afro-Caribbean masterpiece. With its staccato cowbell pattern, jazzy piano lines and rough trombone riffs, “Calle luna calle sol” is one of Colón’s most inspired compositions – a cynical narrative about the dangerous streets of Puerto Rico, and one of salsa’s most enduring anthems. Co-written by the duo, “El día de mi suerte” is a deeper track, peerless in its vocal arrangement and instrumental complexity, the bitter lament of a luckless man that becomes even the more poignant considering that Lavoe died in 1993 at 46 years of age. “Todo tiene su final” is funky and philosophical, using a number of clever metaphors to support its thesis that everything comes to an end – including, as it turns out, the mercurial partnership between both artists.

Tracklist:
SIDE A
1. Señora Lola
2. Todo tiene su final
3. La María
4. Junio 73

SIDE B
1. Calle luna calle sol
2. Vo so
3. El día de mi suerte
4. Guajira ven

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