Presente

In 2003, two years after Gotan Project made electro tango cool, the Argentinian-Uruguayan collective known as Bajofondo Tangoclub debuted to some acclaim. Their take on tango-electronica successfully picked up where Gotan Project have left off.

Now, having dropped ‘Tangoclub’ from its name some time ago, the Grammy-winning group, fronted by the Oscar-winning producer Gustavo Santaolalla, mixes folk, electronica, middle-of-the-road rock and, yes, still some tango. The final product occasionally sounds at times like something a Bontempi electric keyboard might deliver when set to automatic, and at others like 80s film music. Presente is, above all, an eclectic album, featuring as it does an a capella song, lounge music, some disco-paced, power-chord-packed stadium fillers, loads of strings, some sub-Philip Glass piano cycles and even a River Plate folk riff or two. Sadly, this expansiveness means that the collective have removed the tango from more than just their name. And Santaolalla’s lead, I suspect, has killed the clubbiness.