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Since opening in January, the Old Town School’s Szold Hall has supplemented the local institution’s broader mission of education with weekly “global” dance parties, and while tonight’s Chicha Libre show isn’t billed as such, it might as well be. The Brooklyn combo doesn’t so much ask you to shake something as insist on it. Chicha Libre’s eclectic musical appetite is reflected not only in its international roster, but in its intoxicating brew of cumbia and chicha, the former’s Peruvian, surf-rock-splashed cousin. The group might find Szold Hall to be an analog to Barbès, the Park Slope world-music hub that functions both as the band’s stage and record label.
The sextet’s accordion-flecked, cuatro-brushed grooves pile on an array of influences and contain countless cultural references, from the smoky French baritone seducing à la Serge Gainsbourg on “L’Age d’Or” to the group’s chipper take on Wagner’s “The Ride of the Valkyries,” which floats organ buzz and reverb-soaked guitar over a percolating rhythm. Both of those cuts can be heard on Chicha Libre’s second album, Canibalismo, an infectious disc that serves as a percussion-splattered riposte to anyone whose notion of Latin fusion is limited to the Southern Hemisphere.
05/03/12 >> go there