Embargo

Nights At The Roundtable - Cuarteto D'Aida - 1957

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(Cuarteto D'Aida - Cancion Cubano at its best)

A taste of something recorded in Havana on March 31, 1957 - the legendary Cuarteto D'Aida with an orchestra arranged and led by the equally legendary Arturo "Chico" O'Farrill.

This is a whole world of music not a lot of people (at least here in the U.S.) have checked out, or even been exposed to. Thanks to films like Buena Vista Social Club, awareness of this rich vein of musical culture has finally come back into light. Sadly, it's been hidden away for too many years. Blame the Cuban revolution in 1959, blame the U.S. embargo, blame lots of things. Fact is - it's great music and it's gone unnoticed for a very long time. But lots of it, like this track, Profecia, have been sitting in the vaults at RCA and other U.S. labels and haven't been reissued since they first came out. RCA had studios in Havana and recorded a lot of these groups, as did many other labels. Fortunately, much of it is being reissued and discovered and is slowly becoming available.

So if this track appeals - there's a lot more where that came from.



November 12, 1979 - The Hits Just Keep On Comin'!

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(November 12, 1979 - Getting a bit testy all around)

As the hostage drama continued to unfold (still at over 60 sitting in the Embassy in Tehran), Jimmy Carter started imposing sanctions on the Iranians, to not much success.

Jimmy Carter: “I am ordering that we discontinue purchasing of any oil from Iran for delivery to this country."

Making matters worse, demonstrations were popping up at college campuses all over, especially in Los Angeles, where Iranian students demonstrated in support of the hostage takers and the anti-Iranian crowd started making their presence felt.

All in all, it was clearly not going to be solved any time soon, and situations only made a bad situation worse.

And there was that added bonus of Ronald Reagan declaring his candidacy for President - to be official the next day.

Interesting coincidence, that.

Here is an excerpt of the day, as heard over KNX in Los Angeles