Original released on LP Capitol T 1355 (mono)
(US, 1960)
A follow-up
to the popular "Skins! Bongo Party" with Les Baxter LP of 1957, Les Baxter's "Teen
Drums" returns the easy listening maestro to pure beat territory, and the
results are as wholesome as the squeaky-clean youngsters grinning on the album
cover. Producer/arranger/marimbist Baxter collected a group of session
percussionists schooled in various foreign rhythms (Afro-Cuban, Puerto Rican,
Brazilian) and steered them through 11 improvised selections. Congas, bongos,
tom toms, and timbales are employed, surrounded by the occasional saxophone,
piano, or guitar to rein in any stray solo excursions. "Ting Ting
Ting" and "Brazil Nuts" start the album off with appropriately
busy rhythms, but the furor fades and "Teen Drums" delivers skeletal arrangements
and tightly restrained beats without aggression or abstraction, fading easily
into the background as Baxter probably intended. The jazzy "I Dig"
swings the hardest, "Barbarian" shoots for (and misses) some Link
Wray-style guitar rumble, and "Boombada" rewrites the "Peter
Gunn Theme" for an imaginary film noir soundtrack. Les Baxter's "Teen Drums" is well-behaved exotica, a pleasant approximation of romantic rhythms for the
average space-age bachelor's cocktail party. (Fred Beldin in AllMusic)
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