BLOPS [AKA: DEL VOLAR DE LAS PALOMAS]

The Blops were probably the lesser known of the big three progressive folk bands to come out of Chile in the early seventies, along with El Congreso and Los Jaivas. Overall I’d say their music ranks just ever so slightly below both of those bands in terms of its dynamic appeal, but each of these bands has their strengths and weaknesses. Los Jaivas was probably the most commercially successful of the three having scored major label contracts with EMI and later Columbia, and with a few albums released even in North America. For me, Congreso is the more authentic Chilean folk band, with both instrumentation and arrangements that both remain true to their native roots, and expand on the sonic qualities of the music to take it quite a bit beyond mere folk songs.

Blops are not quite either, with pretty authentic-sounding compositions but little serious experimentation on their first albums, and their records today were nearly impossible to find in Chile or anywhere else until Shadoks Music reissued them all on a 3-CD boxed- set last year.

This second album is rather like the first, and both are comparable to Los Jaivas debut (which is also impossible to find today). All three suffer a bit from spotty production and what sounds like four-track mixing. All are quite staid compared to the bands’ later works. And none really reach too far beyond a rather traditional folk sound. Don’t get me wrong, traditional Chilean folk music is quite elaborated and expressive, but we’re talking about progressive music here and these three albums don’t quite rise to that level.

Like the other Chilean folk bands Los Blops employ native instruments like the charango, tarka, hand drums and acoustic percussion. There are also some strings I can’t quite place but which seem to be coming from a cello. Those are quite nice. But these songs for the most part come off as rather dated and not unlike the stuff your mother would have listened to on the radio back in the day, assuming your mother is South American.

The two tracks that stand out a bit are the post-Mersey/psych-sounding “la Rodandera” and the acoustic guitar/flute heavy “Pisándose la Cola”, which also features some well-coordinated male vocal harmonies. But that’s about it; the rest of the album is decent folk, but not really progressive and not really all that memorable.

I wouldn’t recommend trying to find an original release of this album unless you just like to spend way too much for average music. If you really want to get into the Blops, pick up the much more reasonably-priced reissue of all the studio albums in the 3- box set if you can find it. Somewhat recommended to fans of bands like Los Jaivas and Congreso, but unfortunately I have to say this is a two star album.

peace