Esquivel! - Space-Age Bachelor Pad Music

Here it is... the ultimate music for the new cocktail culture: after Grunge comes Space Age Bachelor Pad Music ... A sound that is guaranteed to astound your stereo. The sound has it's origins in the Hi-Fidelity Sound Explosion of the early 60's when all of America was buying those new-fangled, two-channel stereo systems. Folks needed specially designed records to test-drive their hi-fi's and people like Martin Denny, Perrey Kingsley and Henry Mancini delivered the goods. Tinged with cocktail lounge and ballroom overtones, the music was re-christened Space Age Bachelor Pad Music by used record scavengers in the 1980s. Today, bands like Combustible Edison and The Coctails are carrying on the tradition, and a nation jaded with rock and thirsty for new musical sounds, is plugging in.

The undisputed King of Space Age Bachelor Pad Music was -- and is -- a cat from south of the border named Esquivel. One reviewer called him a "pop avant-gardist." Esquivel's orchestrations were like an exploding musical pinata with arrangements that were strikingly futuristic: scattered among the pianos and trombones were slide guitar, echo, dissonance, beatnik percussion and weird juxtapositions of mood and volume. His "kitchen sink" approach incorporated Chinese bells, organ, jew's harp, gourd, and timbales.

Esquivel! - Space-Age Bachelor Pad Music