posted 2/28/2008 11:50:00 AM

Joe Bataan: Latin Soul Legend

by Stormchild

Despite what most people thought when Joe Bataan topped the European charts with "Rap-O Clap-O" in 1980, he wasn't a new kid on the block, nor was "Rap-O Clap-O" his first chart buster -or a very good representation of the music he was known for among his longtime fans in America. In fact, Joe had been recording for well over a decade (his first U.S. hit was "Crystal Blue Persuasion" on the Uptite label in 1969) and he was known as the "The King of Latin R&B".

Singer/pianist/songwriter/producer Joe Bataan was born Peter Nitollano in 1942 of African-American and Filipino parents and grew up in El Barrio (Spanish Harlem), New York. As a teenager, he was caught riding in a stolen car and was sentenced to five years in prison. When he got out of jail in 1961, he decided to dedicate himself to music and taught himself to play the piano. By the early seventies, Joe was signed to Mericana, a label owned by brothers Joe, Ken and Stanley Cayre, who were important distributors of Latin and Salsa records. In 1973-74, Joe released "Salsoul", an album that would lend its name to the Dance-music label the Cayre's were just starting up at that time; a project which Joe also helped fund.

Joe's first LP on Salsoul came out in 1975. Suitably entitled "Afro-Filipino", it gave him his biggest hit to date (at least on the American R&B charts); an instrumental version of Gil Scott-Heron's "The Bottle", which Joe subtitled "La Botella". In British Dance circles, Joe is also remembered as the producer and pianist on fellow New Yorker and sax player Laso's instrumental cover of Stevie Wonder's "Another Star"; a cult Disco track which was pulled from a 1977 LP on MCA. To the rest of Europe, however, Joe was the man who delivered "Rap-O Clap-O", which probably was the very first Rap record a lot of people on this side of the Atlantic ever heard. Issued in November, 1979, just some four weeks after Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" and Fatback's "King Tim III", "Rap-O Clap-O" sounds as infectious today as it did back then. Strangely enough, it was only an underground hit in the U.S.A., but the minute it was issued in Europe, it literally raced up the charts. It went all the way to #1 in Belgium, #2 in Holland and sold Gold in both countries. The subsequent album "Mestizo", named after Joe's backing band, landed on the shelves a year later. Shortly thereafter, Joe embarked on a tour that took him to France, Italy and Germany. Included on that LP were also several other outstanding Disco-Rap-Funk cuts like "Sadie (She Smokes)" and "Rap-O Dance-O". The 1981 follow-up "Joe Bataan II" failed to produce another worldwide smash. "Ling Ching Tong", was the only track where Joe rapped, instead the album marked a return to the style that had originally earned him the "King of Latin R&B" title.

According to an article in the Philadelphia Daily News in October 1997, Joe left the business in the eighties and concentrated on raising his family. But in 1995, Joe was lured back into performing after receiving a standing ovation at a benefit show held at Hotos College in the Bronx. Joe's band -which included his wife of twenty-six years, Yvonne, on vocals- went on to play in South America, California and New York City. Joe has also returned to recording, issuing at least three albums "Salsoul" ('95), "Joe Bataan 2" ('96) and "Last, Album, Last Song" (Bataan Music, '97). He works as a counselor for juveniles in New York State's Department of Justice and The Philadelphia Daily News reported that Joe was happy to see that something he had been doing for thirty years was "starting to catch on with other groups."

While his musical contemporaries have either retired or are stuck performing their decades old material, Joe Bataan has again reinvented with his first new CD album in 20 years, "Call My Name" on VampiSoul Records (www.VampiSoul.com), a European release recorded in 2004 at New York's famed Daptone Studios. Upon hearing Joe Bataan today, nearly 40 years after his first album "Gypsy Woman" hit the charts, one notes that Joe's vocal chops are still in magnificent form. The new release sports the single "Chick-A-Boom," which allows Joe to once again set turntables and dance floors ablaze with this boogaloo-influenced thriller.

With "Call My Name" riding to international acclaim, non-stop gigging on both sides of the Atlantic (including some tours with Marc Ribot & Los Cubanos Postizos as his band), a forthcoming biography, coupled with his first live solo LP in the works, worldwide fans can rest assured that Mr.New York is not content to rest on his laurels and achievements of the past 4 decades. Joe Bataan is just getting started!

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