Afro-Cuban Top Spin

Billy Gibbons must have seen the classic Saturday Night Live skit in which Christopher Walken, as Blue Oyster Cult’s session producer, keeps telling Will Ferrell he needs more cowbell on “Don’t Fear the Reaper.” On his debut solo release, Perfecatmundo, it’s not cowbell that’s overwhelming, but timbales. By the time you get to to the end of the record, it feels like you’ve been hit over the head repeatedly with a stack of Tito Puente records. Turns out that reference is not that far off. Prior to the ’69 launch of ZZ Top, Gibbons took Latin percussion lessons from Puente in Manhattan. But unlike Walken’s scripted producer role, Gibbon’s participation was for-real and hands-on – he’s co-producing and playing timbales throughout Perfectamundo.

It starts off sounding like a Top project, Gibbons croaking endearments to his beloved like a hoodooed swamp thing. The Puente Afro-Cuban feel starts to seep in with a few brief timbale tattoos before Gibbons switches to guitar, with one of his trademark tube-screamer guitar attacks. But it’s not a total makeover. Slim Harpo’s original had a vaguely Latin feel, but with much softer percussion. Gibbons gets a Santana feel going later in the song, doing a call-and-response duet with piano (Martin Guigui) and B-3 (Mike Flanigan.)

Roy Head’s ’65 hit “Treat Her Right” gets a thorough transformation, all Latined up and ready to mambo, thanks to Guigi’s piano inserts dropped in Eddie Palmieri style. Palmieri started out as a drummer and was renowned for his muscular, percussive piano style.

Percussion plays a huge role on Perfectamundo. Drummer Greg Morrow sounds like he’s using an axe and a chopping block for his floor- and rack-mounted skins, firing of a .45 for the kick drum. Gibbons has the tubes howling once again as this beast crashes and bashes its way across the dance floor.

“You’re Really What’s Happening, Baby” sounds like vintage “Slipping Into Darkness”-era War, sneaky and snaky, auto-tuned and hip-hopped up by bassist Alex Garza’s vocal drop-ins. But once again, it’s Gibbons who puts his signature on this one, with that nasty, greasy, Top Texas grange grunge guitar.

“Sal Y Pimento” (Salt and Pepper”) is the first openly Afro-Cuban item on the menu. Topped off with a sprinkling of ZZ, Gibbons is in timbale heaven, tapping away like the Mambo King himself.

“Picking Up Chicks on Dowling Street” sounds like a Top cut, Gibbons chewing up the furniture with chainsaw guitar licks, some sneaky Samba sashaying in towards the end.

Singer/composer Big Joe Williams never envisioned “Baby Please Don’t Go” driven by a beat more associated with shimmy than jailhouse blues. But Rose Mitchell did back in 1954, with a handclap and strum-driven version that sounds more flamenco than Gibbons and company’s hard stomping, gritty presentation.

The title cut sounds like Gibbons invited the whole global village into the studio and told ’em to go nuts. It’d be easier to try to name a style of music that’s not included than the ones that are. Sounds like Queen with AC/DC’s Angus Young and Gibbons sitting in. and Puente guesting on timbales.

You may hafta pour this one through your ear canals a few times to soak up all the nuances. But once it saturates your system, you’ll accept no substitutes. It is, as advertised, perfectamundo.