April in Managua - The Central American Peace Concert 1983

I'm a bit upset that I won't be able to show my face at the G20 actions in London over the coming week, but I'm sending all my best wishes to all those who do attend. I do think its important to remember though, that this 21st century activisim is not a new phenomena. The struggle for an egalitarian society has been ongoing since...well, since hierarchies first emerged. These protests are a part of that history, and so is the music on today's post.

The album I'm posting today was picked up in my local YMCA charity shop a couple of months ago. I had no idea what it was at the time but it looked interesting so I paid my money and took my chance. It turns out that this is a fantastic recording of a historic concert that took place in the capital of Nicaragua in 1983. The concert was organised by the revolutionary Sandinista government at the time when the country was coming under more intense attacks from the US backed right wing Contra guerrillas. The concert, which featured a some of the biggest names in the Latin American 'nueva cancion' movement (Chico Barque, Mercedes Sosa, Silvio Rodriguez, Amparo Ochoa), was therefore a show of solidarity with the emancipatory desires of the Nicaraguan people, the heart and soul of a people in the midst of an intense struggle for change.

Documentary footage of the concert, complete with some great interviews with members of the crowd, can be viewed over here, in the meantime you can check this breathtaking performance by Argentinian singer, Mercedes Sosa:



I've posted the album as 4 separate mp3s rather than break it into individual tracks. I feel the concert is worth listening to as a whole.

You can download it HERE.

And here's the tracklist:

SIDE 1:
Luis Enrique Mejia Godoy - Yo Soy De Un Puebla Sencillo
Gabino Polmares & Amparo Ochoa - La Maldición De Mailinche
Luis Rico - El Salvador
Amparo Ochoa - Para Amar En Tiempo De Guerra
Amparo Ochoa - Quién Tiene La Voz

SIDE 2:
Ali Primera - El Sombrero Azul
Chico Buarque - O Que Será
Chico Buarque & Raymundo Fagner - Nao Existe Pecado...
Silverio Pérez & Quintento Puertoriqueno - Canción De Pueblo
Silvio Pérez & Quintento Puertoriqueno - Qué Bonita Bandera

SIDE 3:
Daniel Viglietti - Declaratión De Amor A Nicaragua
Daniel Viglietti - Canción Para Mi América
Adrián Goizueta & Grupo Experimental - Eugenia
Silvio Rodríguez - El Dulce Abismo
Silvio Rodríguez & Manguare - Canción Urgente Para Nicaragua

SIDE 4:
Carlos Mejía Godoy & Los De Palacagüina - Nicaragua Nicaraguita
Carlos Mejía Godoy & Los De Palacagüina - Chilotito Tierno
Carlos Mejía Godoy & Los De Palacagüina - No Passarán
Mercedes Sosa - Solo Le Pido A Dios
Mercedes Sosa - Cuanda Tenga La Tierra

Killer rats and the pleasure of leisure

Today's billboard for the local newspaper contained a headline that conjured some horrific mental images and almost got me worrying about giant, slavvering mutoid rodents with fangs and a taste for human flesh... maybe like these ones:

Apart from fretting about killer beasts, I've been looking for work now that I've found myself 'inbetween jobs'. Its a full time occupation, and one that I get bored with very quickly...all that form-filling, trying to make yourself sound employable, what an impossible task. Despair at my predicament led me to reread Bob Black's great piece of ludic utopianism, The Abolition of Work:

"No one should ever work.

Work is the source of nearly all the misery in the world. Almost any evil you'd care to name comes from working or from living in a world designed for work. In order to stop suffering, we have to stop working.

That doesn't mean we have to stop doing things. It does mean creating a new way of life based on play; in other words, a ludic revolution. By "play" I mean also festivity, creativity, conviviality, commensality, and maybe even art. There is more to play than child's play, as worthy as that is. I call for a collective adventure in generalized joy and freely interdependent exuberance. Play isn't passive. Doubtless we all need a lot more time for sheer sloth and slack than we ever enjoy now, regardless of income or occupation, but once recovered from employment-induced exhaustion nearly all of us want to act."

It's a very entertaining piece from the self proclaimed 'Groucho Marxist', and if you've ever dreamed of escape from the pressures of the grind, then you should check it out.