Arrow – Hot Hot Hot (1982) (Arrow Records-019)

Arrow
Hot Hot Hot
1982 Arrow Records ARROW-019

According to my well-placed sources, there was a time where you couldn’t go to a party in the Caribbean without somebody playing this record, or at least the title cut.  Monserrat native and Pillies fan Arrow (Alphonsus Cassell) had been releasing calypso and soca albums since the early 70’s, but most people outside the region will probably know the title track from the tepid “Buster Poindexter” version by David Johansen.  It’s a classic summertime jam, now with year-round appeal as our planet boils toward climate catastrophe and mass species extinction.   (continued below)

A1 Menu 6:05
A2 Money-Money 5:38
A3 Party Hopping 6:01
B1 Hot-Hot-Hot 7:07
B2 Pulling Bull 5:53
B3 Pirates 5:41

Recorded At – Eras Recording Studio
Mixed At – Eras Recording Studio

Alto Saxophone – Eddie Quarless
Arranged By – Leston Paul
Art Direction, Design – Keith Charles, Peter Narine
Backing Vocals – Bianca Baptiste, Charmaine Yates, Justin “Hero” Cassell, Steve Robins (3), Timothy “Baron” Watkins
Bass – Clarence “Oungku” Edwards, Malcom “Bassie” Wilson*
Composed By, Performer, Producer, Directed By – Alphonsus “Phonsie” Cassell (Arrow)
Congas – O’Neil Haynes
Drums – Errol Wise
Engineer [Recording & Mixing] – Joshua Harris
Executive Producer – Alphonsus Cassell (Arrow)
Guitar – Clarence Edwards, Jeff Medina, Junior Wharwood, Stephen McIntosh
Keyboards – Leston Paul
Lead Guitar – Christopher “Columbus” Newland
Percussion – Juan Clouden, Victor See Yuen
Photography By – Erik Akerblom, Harold Prieto
Tenor Saxophone – Dennis Wilkinson
Trombone – Henry Mitchell
Trumpet [1st] – Mac Gollehon
Trumpet [2nd] – Clyde Mitchell

Notes
Recorded & Mixed at Eras Studios-New York.

Distribution:
Caribbean Islands – West Indies Records (Barbados) LTD
Jamaica – Dynamic Sounds Recording Co. LTD
U.S.A. – J&M One Stop Records
Canada – F&T Distribution
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LINEAGE: Arrow Records ARROW-019 vinyl; Pro-Ject RM-5SE with Audio Tecnica AT440-MLa cartridge; Speedbox power supply; Creek Audio OBH-15; Audioquest King Cobra cables; M-Audio Audiophile 192 Soundcard ; Adobe Audition at 32-bit float 96 khz; clicks and pops removed with Click Repair on very light settings, manually auditioning the output; further clicks removed with Adobe Audition 3.0; dithered and resampled using iZotope RX Advanced. Converted to FLAC in either Trader’s Little Helper or dBPoweramp. Tags done with Foobar 2000 and Tag and Rename.

Johansen probably heard the hit while on vacation or something, but hey, at least he didn’t change the title and lyrics and credit it to himself (I’m looking at you, Rod Stewart, e.g. the theft of “Taj Mahal” from Jorge Ben..).  Hot Hot Hot is a very solid soca album all the way through though, with every cut carrying its weight and not just the Road March carnival hit.  It may be the only ear-worm here but songs like “Party Hopping” and “Pulling Bull” (a slower tune, by soca standards) would be stand-out tunes on most other records.  The record closes with the tune Pirates, an indictment against traders in unauthorized music – understandably a thorn in the side of an entrepreneur like Arrow who had been running his own label for over a decade – which may be very outdated now, but is undeniably funkier and more effective than trying to set the slogan “Home Taping Is Killing Music” to a soca rhythm.

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