New York, NY (Top40 Charts) The new studio album by Grammy Nominee group CAMPO "Tambor Del Cosmos" (Sony Mexico), an album created between Montevideo and Shanghai, is on sale now and available in all digital platforms worldwide. "Tambor Del Cosmos" will be officially presented in a concert at the FIMPRO music conference and festival next May in Guadalajara.
Since their first album released in 2011, Campo, the uruguayan group created by Juan Campodónico, has sought to combine from a new and unprejudiced vision several musical worlds. The quartet draws inspiration from popular South American music as well as global and trendsetting sounds. In their first album, the group surprised their audience by mixing cumbia villera with Britpop and 80's rock with bolero and cha cha cha.
In Tambor del Cosmos, those innovated searches are still present: emphasizing the songs in a more direct form while maintaining the rhythmic side, which is one of Campo's sound signatures. "I've always liked music that makes your body move, while the melody or lyrics say something more introspective; more intimate...
Music that has many layers and interpretations," Juan Campodónico says.
The song that opens and gives the name to the album, interpreted by Gustavo Santaolalla, incorporates one of the ideas that inspired the concept of Tambor del Cosmos. "The drum is the connection with the cosmos in the African world," Juan explains. "For us, the music we make and the beat is a connection with something deep and full of meaning. That is what the title refers to: the connection to the cosmos that we can have through music as a sensory experience."
The participation of Gustavo Santaolalla as an invited vocalist is not casual or by accident. The Argentinean musician and producer has not only been Juan's musical partner since the time of Peyote Asesino and then in Bajofondo; His innovative work with his group Arco Iris in the early 1970's in attempt to find a Latin American identity accompanied by new global sounds.
That "cosmic" vision that's at the same time both organic and earthly, is also delivered in the folkloric ethereal lullaby "Duerme agua", performed by Verónica Loza, one of the most delicate songs in the album.
Unlike the debut album that was more of a labor by producers with different collaborators, Tambor del
Cosmos is a group album; with the creative core of Campo - Juan Campodónico, Martín Rivero, Boni and Verónica Loza - working together. Together they coexist the electronic sounds of Boni with Martín Rivero's
most melodic vein or Vero Loza's folkloric touches with the global vision of Campodónico.
"Bailar quieto", the song that served as an advance for the album is a good example of these complementary visions and at the same time shows another distinctive attraction of Campo: the group's revisits of massive Latin American genres that are often taken for granted, and finding their beauty and originality. With its mix of reggaeton and cumbia with pop and electronic, the song invites you to dance even though the lyrics speak poetically of not being able to do so.
The indie pop combines with melancholy in tracks like "Huracán", "Shanghái", "Unicornio" and "Solo" sung by Martín Rivero. The most poetic and dreamy
song appears in "Despertar" in the voice of Juan Campodónico. The South American rhythms such as funk dance and the Uruguayan candombe are combined with trendy music in "Color" and "
Wasted". "
Wasted", the only English song on the album, features the very young voice of Lucía Torrón, one of the other guests of the album. The album closes with "Vals del Infinito", a song that like others from Campo, seem to come from a remote past with a contemporary touch that makes it unique.
The album was recorded in Montevideo by
Julio Berta and the mix was finished in Los Angeles with Aníbal Kerpel. In addition to the usual collaborators of the band: Roberto Rodino (drums), Gabriel Casacuberta (bass, marimba) and
Daniel "Tatita" Márquez (percussion), other participants were
Luciano Supervielle on keyboards, Javier Casalla on the violin and chord arrangement on Vals de Infinito and Lucía Torrón on the choruses.
"Tambor del Cosmos" is the successor album of CAMPO (2011), the album that was nominated for the U.S.A Grammys, Latin Grammys and for the MTV European
Music Awards. In the middle of the two were Remixes & Rarezas (2014), an album that includes live recordings, demos, remixes, versions and curiosities, which show another side of Campo, and Nocturno (2015) the soundtrack composed for the Ballet Nacional Sodre directed by
Julio Bocca.
