Remezcla/Pe

Remezcla is ‘remix’ in Spanish; Pe is the URL country code of Peru. Each of the 15 songs on this compilation album pairs a Latin American DJ with a Peruvian musician; the latter, however, are an interesting mix of folk, hip-hop, cumbia, tropical psychedelia, Afro-Peruvian and pop artists. What remixers such as Carla Valenti from Chile, El Remolón from Argentina, Bial Hclap from Mexico and Qoqeqa from Peru bring to the fiesta are respectful downtempo treatments (as on ‘Harwawi’), spacious soundscapes (‘Pregones’), urbane cool (‘El Pescador’) and experimental exercises (‘Festejo de Ritmo’).

Each of these don't detract from the original genres but rather reimagine them, meaning you prick up your ears and switch on your brain while swaying darkly around an über-underground Lima nightclub – or your living room in Leicester, etc.

Folk music can sometimes be much of a muchness, trapped in its trad instruments, tight rhythms and conservative clichés. Here artists and geeks unite to spice up the bland, cut up the palimpsest. All the tracks are of interest, that's no small achievement, and the sheer variety of noises, beats, vibes and voices (instrumental and human) ensures you that Gotan Project ‘after party’ ennui never sets in. The blurb says this Franco-Peruvian production marks the occasion of the bicentennial of the independence of Peru; the reconquista is happening, and it's very cool and groovy, señorxs.