La Radiolina

Manu Chao | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 4, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Nacional Records
• ASIN: B000SQJ27I
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,915 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #21 in Music > Latin Music > Latin Rock
  • #31 in Music > World Music > Rock
  • #35 in Music > World Music > Europe > Continental Europe > France

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Americans waited six years for a new studio album from one of the most exciting ambassadors of cosmopolitan party/protest music. Infusing rock fundamentals with elements of ska, reggae, punk, and Afro-pop since fronting Mano Negra ("Black Hand") in 1986, Chao's grown by continental leaps as a bandleader since then, as La Radiolina's mix of festival-rousing rock, defiant politics, and multilingual lyrics attests. Lead single "Rainin in Paradize" alone should propel Chao (née Oscar Tramor) into the kind of stateside fame he's long enjoyed in Europe and South America. Elsewhere, individual songs suggest direct antecedents--"Mundoreves," for example, recalls the Eagles' "Hotel California" with minimal subtlety--but Manu Chao is an unabashed citizen of the world, and to peg his music to specific forebears is in part to miss the point. Perhaps the most iconic of La Radiolina's songs, "The Bleedin Clown" portrays its protagonist's will to "make the children happy," but despite his sounding almost deflated by weary resignation, this sad character sketch still can't manage to drag the music away from its unrelenting, celebratory flavor. Rare is the artist who can rock a sad world so well. Chao is it. --Jason Kirk

Product Description

Chao recently completed his most extensive North American tour date, following a highly acclaimed co-headlining performance at this years Coachella festival as well as the Bonnaroo and Sasquatch festivals. Each of his prior two solo albums have sold more than 2000,000 units in the United States alone. Manu Chao is a global Latin music star who expresses himself in multiple languages.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Manu rocks out!, October 5, 2007

By 

James Rhodes "Deep Thought" (St. Louis) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: La Radiolina (Audio CD)

I'm a real Manu Chao fan and while I originally felt this album was a bit too repetitious, I've gotten to really enjoy this CD more and more since I've had it. It is very fast paced but I really enjoy a lot of the material on the CD. It's another good CD by Manu Chao.

41 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars ADD Kills, October 9, 2007

By 

doomsdayer520 (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: La Radiolina (Audio CD)

Manu Chao is quite the interesting cat, with potentially joyous and groundbreaking music that celebrates international culture while slyly resisting globalization. He's got a fresh and intriguing sound that mixes Europop with world music of the Latin/Afro/Caribbean persuasions, with some westernized rock and rhythm mixed in. His lyrics jumping amongst five different languages are also a polyglot delight. With so much going for him, it's hard to imagine how Manu Chao could create such a massively disappointing and annoying misuse of his skills. This album contains 21 largely interchangeable tracks that zoom by with the validity of poorly-designed mashups and with not much more impact than a series of ringtones. The five so-called bonus tracks are merely undeveloped snippets of riffs and melodies that already appeared earlier, and most of the songs overall end quickly after failing to develop a series of very similar basic ideas. This album's production process suffered an ADD-addled breakdown.

An ignoramus would say that all the songs sound the same, but here the discerning listener will find that many of them really ARE the same. Five different songs contain the exact same backing tracks with minimally different melodies on top, and even more songs than that contain the same irritating four-note ascending guitar line. Other basic melodies are also recycled (not reprised, mind you) throughout the album. The initially lovely ballad "A Cosa" also reuses a backing track that Manu contributed to an album by African popsters Amadou & Mariam two years ago. Reprising themes throughout an album can be an effective artistic device, but here it's just widespread replication of undeveloped ideas. Hence, only a few songs in this mishmash can truly stand on their own, such as the sly "Politik Kills" or the rockin' "Rainin in Paradize" (which is the first, and only useful,, appearance of that annoying riff). Otherwise, this album is little more than quantities of different manifestations of a very limited number of quality ideas. You may get the feeling that the album takes longer to listen to than it did to record. [~doomsdayer520~]

21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Welcome to paradise!, September 3, 2007

By 

E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: La Radiolina (Audio CD)

Manu Chao is a not what you think of "world music" as being. For many people, that equals weird, inaccessable music played on instruments you can't identify.

In the case of Manu Chao, it means something far warmer and more enjoyable, full of driving catchy Eurorock rhythms, funky edges, a crazy Spanish flavour, and vaguely political sensibilities. It's been six years since his last internationally-released album, but "La Radiolina" (translation: the little radio) was an event worth waiting for.

It kicks off with the "13 D¡as," a racing blur of folky-rocky-guitar and lots of mumbling. But that's only the warm-up into the melodious, brass-band-edged rocker "Tristeza Maleza," which sounds like Spoon got invaded by Andalusian musicians, and the hypnotic guitar-rap of "Politik Kills ("Politik needs your mind/politik needs human beings/politik needs lies...")

And with the driving, blurring, siren-laden "Rainin In Paradize," the album really blossoms into all it can be -- colourful bouncy folkpop, sensual ballads, meditative little tunes, driving little rockers flavoured with odd sounds and fiery tight guitars, and a long stretch of swirling Spanish-inspired music.

It finishes up with a wicked trio of songs -- a kinetic, high-speed electrorocker with a sly smile woven into all the buzzing, a meditative little instrumental on acoustic guitar, and finally the driving "Y Ahora Qu_" with its blazing bass and ringing riffs.

It's a suitably energetic finale to an album that is uptempo and intense, but without being oppressive about it. Instead, Mano Chao gives his music a relaxed feel -- it's like being at a colourful nighttime party with plenty of food, drink and dancing, but in a city full of turmoil during the day.

The main instrument here is guitar, and it's played here with extreme versatility -- depending on who's playing it, it can form driving, hard riffs, peppy pop rhythms, or a sensual cascade of gentle flamenco strings. Wound around it is a colourful array of other instruments -- blaring rows of trumpets, rattling drums, strong basslines, and waves of looping, buzzing and/or shimmering keyboard. It's pretty intense,

I'm ashamed to admit that I don't know more than a spattering of Spanish or French, and only a little more Spanglish. But the meaning behind many of these songs is pretty clear, with Chao taking aim with his smooth voice -- the violent face of politics, the "wind of Washington," and the "paradises" of the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe with its fatalities, atrocities, and rain.

Manu Chao's colourful, world-music style is one that it's hard not to warm to, and "La Radiolina" is a primo example of what he can conjure. Beautiful, creative and full of life.