LOS JAIVAS [AKA: EL INDIO]

This is not my first LOS JAIVAS experience. I had previously heard "Obras de Violeta Parra" though I never physically owned the album (I had a digital download of it). In the case of this self-titled record, on the other hand, I've had enough time to familiarize myself with the music.

As a reviewer already stated, it will be difficult for people without a previous taste for South American music to get to understand and truly like the music from LOS JAIVAS. There's a lot of folk elements here, both in the instrumentation and in the melodies and rhythms. In fact, I can say that the rock element in "Los Jaivas" is, at times, difficult to find, and it's only on the last track that the Chilean band fully embrace the genre.

The album starts with a very folky track, followed by another one in a different style, which shows that, at least in the folk side of things, LOS JAIVAS were not circumscribed to music from their own country (Chile) but they adopted and adapted sounds from all throughout the LatinAmerica. Actually, "Guajira Cosmica" reminds me of a song dedicated to a much celebrated (to my dismay) revolutionary figure in the continent (though LOS JAIVAS don't come out as politically-charged, an oddity for a band of 70's Chile). The two short songs are rather forgettable, and it's only in the last song, "Tarka y Ocarina", where the group finally manages to create a proper symbiosis of rock and folk. In this track the influences of psychedelic rock and jazz are evident, and it's a closer that lifts the album from mediocrity.

A lesser album than "Obras de Violeta Parra", my only other LOS JAIVAS reference, "Los Jaivas" still manages to earn 3 stars from me, mostly due to the adventurous last track. The rest is just too "folkloric" and not enough "rock" even for me, a South American reviewer.