Guantanamera, Si -- Guantanamo, No

Today you have yet another chance to do good while grooving globally.

The Hip Hop Hoodios have released a four-song (or five, depending on where you get it) EP. The title song "Viva la Guantanamera" is an all-star collaboration with wildog of Ozomatli, the Klezmatics, Kemo The Blaxican (of Latin hip-hop pioneers Delinquent Habits), and Walter Miranda (Beastie Boys, Plastilina Mosh).

"When we made the song, I liked the idea of taking that tropical, bucolic image of this prototypical, idyllic Cuban woman, and use that to some extent as a metaphor for the purity of habeas corpus," Hoodio core member Abe Velez told PRI's The World in a recent Global Hit feature. (18% of all profits will be donated to Amnesty International and will go
towards efforts to close the prisons at Guantanamo Bay and to
encourage the full restoration of Habeas Corpus.) You'll hear the legal questions in the hard-hitting rap, though the song retains that familiar classic melody as well.

[mp3] Hip Hop Hoodios: Viva La Guantanamera

Other songs on the EP are "Agua pa' la Gente (DJ Nino/Pinker Tones Remix)," "1492 (Hector Coulon Remix)," and "Havana Nagila (Ahi Nama Remix)."

Listen to the Viva la Guantanamera EP at Calabash

Hip Hop Hoodios myspace
Hoodios website
Amnesty International

tags: worldmusic, cuba, guantanamo, guantanamera, amnesty international, hip hop hoodios