"Cocoa Bango" by Zaruna
Review
It's always a particular pleasure to write my first article in ‘Hot Music Live' about an artist (though it does sometimes leave me open to the enquiry of why it has taken my so long when others have found them before me) but today the distinction falls upon Zaruna whose new single "Cocoa Bango" is the focus of this article.
Zaruna seem to be cropping up regularly on gig lineups & several of my advisers have been steering me towards them for some time: so I'm glad to have the opportunity today.
"Cocoa Bango" in fact follows very swiftly on the heels of "Piss" and therefore I think that I ought to mention both.
On first hearing, you can tell why people like Zaruna: they don't half write an alluring song based on the evidence of these two songs.
They are both on first hearing seductive love songs: they certainly draw you right inside them straight away. Which seems to be stage one of both their charm & their agenda. I honestly doubt whether those advocating Zaruna to me would have done so had the surface of the songs extended deeper. There seems to be musical subversion here and you probably know how much I love playfulness in song.
"Cocoa Bango" in fact is a reggae song inspired by the film ‘The Mask' while "Piss", however much the Eels flavoured tune and romantic lyrics initially promise, resolves (as frankly the title gives away) into what seems to be a celebration of watersports. Of the sexual variety.
I'd say 'I loved this' but probably in doing so had better limit the expression of enjoyment to the song and the stylish radicalism rather than enter into a discussion of the fetish in question which is probably outside the remit of a music magazine.
At any rate, both songs are impossible to dislike (try it: it can't be done) but I do have a penchant for this sort of cleverness wherein songs are like Matryoshka dolls wherein delights lurk until you unpack them (I'd never have got the "Mask" connection without a prompt either), especially where a bit of transgression is on the menu too.
The Zaruna trio are all great musicians who play with a light & subtle touch which is responsible for that easy access I mentioned above and remarkably record in a member's bedroom: you seriously cannot tell that from hearing them.
