November 24, 2007

A musically adventurous collage of dub, bossa nova, lounge, hip-hop and electronica, "Latin Bitman" would be merely background music if there weren't so many happy sonic details popping up. Chile's Jose Antonio "Toto" Bravo (aka DJ Bitman) is delightfully precise in his sampling, knowing where to place that vibraphone, scratch or retro background vocal to make songs out of what otherwise might just be tracks. The guest vocalists are stellar, particularly Jimmy Fernandez on the folksy rap "El Diablo" and the Tom Jones-like Julian Peña on "Tropilove," a groovy, nonsensical gem ("Let's go to the beach with my friends, we're gonna have a good time"). This is house party chill-out music you'll actually pay attention to.—Ayala Ben-Yehuda

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