Los Hombres Calientes Vol.5: Carnival

 
"Come and party with me, y'all," exhorts Bill Summers on Los Hombres Calientes' latest multi-culti celebration, telling you not only what the album is about and where he and co-leader Irvin Mayfield are from--the South, New Orleans to be precise--but also what their attitude is in breezing through Cuban and Brazilian styles, funk and jazz, samba and mambo and salsa. Though they have an agenda as world travelers, they're neither purists nor rootsologists; they're mostly after a good time and will toss anything into the mix to attain it. On "Carnival," their deepest and most sustained effort, their ability to synthesize styles is so secure, tributes to a pair of Crescent City legends, piano maven James Booker and bass funkster George Porter of Meters fame rub off happily on West African and Congolese numbers, and vice versa. Reaching back to the Satchmo tradition with his high, hard-edged, trilling solos, but flashing modernistic colors as well, Mayfield rides over and through the sound while Summer keeps things percolating on his usual assortment of percussion instruments. The hometown cast includes the Rebirth Brass Band, Kermit Ruffins and the Mardi Gras Indians. Party on, indeed. --Lloyd Sachs

According to Basin Street Records: Like a rich, flavorful New Orleans gumbo, Los Hombres Calientes packs a little bit of everything into a tasty, powerful recipe that warms the body and feeds the soul. Led by Irvin Mayfield  the latest in the Crescent Citys illustrious line of acclaimed jazz trumpeters  and Bill Summers, a percussionist who quite simply embodies world-wide rhythm, Los Hombres Calientes is not only changing the way music sounds, but also how music is made.

Taking a hands-on, organic approach in putting together their five albums, Volumes 1-5, Mayfield and Summers take their band on location and join forces with locals in order to create authentic sounds from the places where music began  locations such as Africa, Cuba, Trinidad, Jamaica, Haiti and, of course, their native New Orlean