Here's a departure for this blog - at least I can't remember featuring any Latin music before, unless you consider Carlos Chávez compositions to be a form of Latin music (and I suppose they are).
As the cover indicates, Miguelito Valdés was a Cuban singer who made these records with Machito's great band. And while these might be Cuban rhythms, the records were made in New York, where Valdés lived from 1940 on.
The music, while quite good of its kind, is not nearly as explosive (or as primitive) as the cover would have you expect. Heck, Bim Bam Boom is a song from a Fred Astaire movie! (I do love the cover though.)
The fact that Valdés was performing a 1942 song on this 1949 record leads me to suspect that it is a compilation of singles that he made for Decca throughout the decade. They are most enjoyable, and fairly early examples of the craze for Latin music in the US - one that continues today.
