Customer Reviews

Music from the Chocolate Lands

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Music from chocolate-producing countries like the Congo, India, Brazil, Haiti, Mexico, Ivory Coast, Hawaii, Belize, Peru and Cuba. This album as a whole is light, happy, soft and warm, with lilting rhythms and attractive vocals from artists completely unknown to me, nope not a single one. But hey, they're great so don't let not knowing the bands put you off! Each track is a beautifully-produced gem in its own right. The album opens with a bouncy number from Toto Bona Lokua, three guys from the Congo, Cameroon and Martinique with a catchy French Caribbean sound, great voices and their very own made-up language! Then a languid ballad from Indian Susheela Raman, a breezy folksy song from Brazilian Marcantonio, a jazzy hip-swayer from Haitian Beetova Obas, a club dance number aptly titled "Chocolate Sabroso" from Cuba's Chocolate Armenteros, and so the fun continues.

This album, along with music CDs from the same company such as the coffee lands (Vols. I and II), and tea lands, are great to play outdoors on those lazy summer evenings when you are have a barbecue (particularly some BBQ dish from an exotic country) having cold drinks with a group of friends, and being under the soft backyard party lights.. . It is excellent background music.
I played it last summer while doing a BBQ from a South Pacific cookbook, and everyone was asking about both the dish and the music. Everyone loved them.

Love this product and the seller is super to work with. We'll do more business in the future!

Putumayo is almost a menace, creating compilations that are easy for Americans to indulge in because the selections are always as light an airy as a cream puff. But my interest is in sounds that are different from what I know, and with Putumayo's cds, I never feel like I'm truly learning what music from a particular region has to offer. Still, I find it hard to pass up their compilations, because, all in all, they are pretty nice. There's usually at least one song that makes the watered-downness of the whole venture worthwhile, and this one is no exception. PopMatters put it this way: "For the last 10 years, Putumayo has been marketing world music as easy listening. Bright, flat, cartoony album covers and cutesy compilation concepts ... provide a hint at the sheer softness of a typical Putumayo world music CD. There's percussion in Putumayo's world, of course, but true rhythmic intensity is rare and dissonance completely extinct. Imagine an Africa that never heard of the electric guitar and you're probably not far off the mark. Music From the Chocolate Lands, then, is a typical Putumayo world music CD. World music as easy listening: it's just a terrible idea in the first place, right? Well, right -- but beauty counts for a lot in easy listening, and Chocolate Lands is gorgeous." And to the reviewer's point below--yes, what happened to Ecuador?

one of those CDs your friends will keep asking about.

Worm and cozy, totally groovy. You'll love it.

Chocolate is flavorful.Take the Mexican sauce,mole,that blends unsweetend sugar with various spices,making savory sauces.Unfortunately,"Music from the Chocolate Lands" is the opposite of a spicy mole or even a nice cheap Hershey's bar.If it were chocolate,it would be bland and tasteless.

Putumayo's "Music from the Chocolate Lands" sounds promising with musicians from Brazil,India,Mexico,Haiti and even Belize.There are a few highlights,such as Susheela Raman's superb blend of Indian singing with soul music,and Susana Baca,who introduced Afro-Peruvian music to the world.Teresa Bright's lively Hawaiian chant,complete with native percussion,is a gem.Marcantonio,from Northeastern Brazil,provides a lovely acoustic piece.The closing song by Chocolate Armenteros is a fitting epilogue about flavorful chocolate.

It's too bad that the songs from Think of One,Beethova Obas,Ozomatli,and Andy Palacio/Adrian Martinez basically sound the same.Dobet Gnahore from Ivory Coast has a dull African acoustic song.You're better off with "Music from the Wine Lands"& "Music from the Tea Lands." If this were chocolate,it would be bland.

El mejor chocolate del mundo, sin duda alguna viene de Ecuador y este disco no incluye una cancion de Ecuador; es mas o menos como que Music from Coffeelands no tuviese musica de Colombia o que a un mundial de futbol no asista Brasil.

there was no cover with the cd...perhaps that was in the description....good condition otherwise.