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Tirso Duarte: La timba cubana

Salva…

With this album Tirso Duarte has not been able to overcome the shortcomings of his previous album. Tirso Duarte is one the pillars that many lay their hope for the future of street oriented timba. As always this album has some great compositions by Tirso, but the overall lack of intensity and vitality [and even originality!] leaves the album, and Tirso out of the pimera linea. It took me a long time to add this album to the top ten —my original disapointment and a handfull of more gripping albums led me to put it on the shelf after the first listen — but with killer songs like Salsa cubana and La Habana me quiere are enough to earn a spot on the list and some closer listening to the rest. Cancion romántica, a song tirso has been playing live for years, is also pretty hot, ending in a great bomba climax.  He very effectively incorporates themes from the song he sung with Pupi, Te molesta que sea feliz; in fact, in many ways this seems like a remake not only in the phrasing, but the mood and the lyrical content.