An open (though albeit belated) email to Jon Kwest

From: Neil Queen-Jones
Date: Tues, 6 Sept 2011
To: Jon Kwest
Re: Moombahjaz

Dear Mr Kwest,

It was with great anticipation and a little bit of a Japanese schoolgirl handclap-squeal combo that I received the email from you containing your latest release, Moombahjazz Vol 1, a 108bpm-dembow tribute to the great Tito Puente. Over the past god-knows how long, your tracks have never strayed far from 'oh fucking hell that's very good indeed', and even on the rare occasions that quality does vary, a lesser track would still be worth a solid 'oooooooh!' and a contented facial expression, not dissimilar to when finding a beer tucked away at the back of the fridge.

This time, however, I have to admit that I had some slight reservations. I've become concerned with moombahton's minor obsession with genre assimilation. I even got to the point of having chin-stroking, self-important chats about it with my moombah-peers about the issue, and feared that, on the back of Dust Mask, you too might be veering towards an over-reliance on that. I think there's a threshold of four new sub-genres a week - any more than that and the system starts glitching.

So you can imagine the size of the Japanese schoolgirl squeal-clap combo part 2 when it transpired that within the EP was Chang, an absolute screamer of a track that cannot be reisisted; a glorious, percussive, uplifting and joyous one that carries on the fiesta vibe you recently displayed with Cubia, your also-overwhelming track on Sabo's Moombahton Massive 5 EP.

Chang - Moombahjazz Vol 1 http://www.sendspace.com/file/069nig by Jon Kwest
Jon Kwest - Cubia ft on "Moombahton Massive V" soundcloud.com/solselectas by Jon Kwest

Of course, this does have the added disadvantage of making me look a dick in retrospect in terms of my whole genre cross-polination leading to moombahton retardation thing. But I'll take that swap, just this once.

Keep it up, and ta everso for the freebie.


Yours with an increased sense of faith,


Neil Queen-Jones
www.popculturecarepackage.com