Got this at a show at the Columbus Day Weekend festival that used to held every year at the Rancocas Indian Reservation. (Now held only on Memorial Day Weekend. Bummer.) Used to go with a school trip every year in high school and I still associate Fall with memories of being at the thing. The weather just started turning this weekend and I love it. It’s my favorite weather to stand in a field eating venison chili and fry bread, maybe smoke some “Indian Tobacco” which turns out to be literally regular tobacco grown by the Indians—but whatever—and watch some musical performances which may or may not have anything to do at all with the indigenous tribes of New Jersey. (But it’s a solidarity thing.) It’s too bad. I just grew up in this area, I’m not Native native, but I’ve tried to learn about it.

The main instrument in most Native American music is the drum. The Lenape tribe has a great drum performance but they don’t put records out. Andes Manta have drums, but their main instruments are some mandolin-type things and pipes. Lotta pipes. Various other flutes as well. You could dance to it (they have dancers live) but you could not put this on at a party or anything. Even if it was some kind of South American drug party. It’s not that kind of music. It’s not very trippy at all. If you like Paul Simon…you won’t like this, there’s no white guy singing. But if you know El Condor Pasa that is the general ballpark. Although that song is pretty chill. This music is very lively (and it’s from Ecuador, not Peru), mostly instrumental with some shouts thrown in. It’s really well-recorded considering it must be just a live in studio performance and mic’ing pan pipes is a bit of a challenge. The CD looks kind of cheap, but the recording is worth it.

Sin Fronteras is my jam. A mid-tempo slow burner, it stands out among the other tracks. The melody is introduced on tandem pipes, then after a brief breakdown the two dudes switch to the six-footer bass pan pipes, which is pretty impressive live, trading off notes of the melody several octaves lower. The pipers are panned (yup) left and right to get the full effect on record. I think the song stands alone and I’ve put it on several mixes over the years, but in the middle of the record you’ve spent maybe half an hour with just these flutes and high-pitch guitars, and that pan pipe bass drop sounds so cool. I don’t think that sound exists outside of a meager approximation of a keyboard setting. You can hear their technique, it takes a lot of wind to play those things, even the normal size. Really impressive.

Note on the name of the album: Amazon (which get it’s name from the Andean river, btw) lists this album as self-titled, confusing it with another self-titled album. This is the fault if the packaging, which only puts the album name on the back cover and the CD itself.

Both of these CDs carry the exact same review from a Mr. S. Adkins:

As an avid collector of Andes / Peruvian music, I can say that this is THE best in my large collection. Not one song is a filler on this CD. If you enjoy high quality sound of Peruvian Andes music, this is the CD to buy — and if you only buy one CD of that genre, this is the collection to own.

I’ve only got this one, but I guess I’m doing alright. They’re not the same album however.

But you know what, don’t even buy this one from Amazon you can get it directly from them. Their whole country got stolen, what’s a few bucks? Hell, get some pan pipes while your at it. You will never, ever use them in one of your own songs no matter how much you think you will, but you’ve pretty much have to have at least one. Now you might be thinking, “Hey man, I didn’t steal their country, I’ve never been to that country! And I will learn the pan pipe!” Look, maybe there’s some way, as a North American, you could support your local tribe on Columbus Day. Maybe go into an Indian casino and just intentionally lose a ton of cash. But what does that fix? Can you really fix centuries of cultural genocide? Isn’t even trying to feel better about your personal benefit from that even somehow worse? The only thing you can do is buy those pipes but never play them. But better yet, buy the records and listen to some people that know what they’re doing. And just think about it. %