La Cucaracha Brass: La Cucaracha Brass (Mary Lou 1007)

This is an odd little album that I discovered recently that was put together by Raphie Martinez and Bobby Marin. Six of the eight tracks are reworkings of songs that originally appeared on an earlier Mary Lou Records release, Raphie Martinez's Cool Man Boogaloo LP (Mary Lou 1002). The tracks have different names (slightly or completely), and some have different vocals, but the riffs and basic song structures are exactly the same, and they may have even just reused parts of instrumental tracks in some cases. The two remaining tracks, "Muerto De Risa" and "Papa Na Mas," which I don't recognize from elsewhere, feature vocalist Papo Felix. The one track that I think manages to improve slightly on the older/other version is the boogaloo/Latin soul cut "Hey, Mama" (a reworking of "Do It All Over"), which features Bobby Marin on vocals.


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