Background 
Laghonia : Etcetera (PER,1971)***°'
Repsychled Laghonia : Unglue (PER,1967-1970)*°'
Lahonia was formerly know as The New juggler Sound (1965 to 1971). This group made a couple of singles, and after a line-up change changed their name to Laghonia, and just took those songs along to the new band's repertoire.
I have never heard the first album yet (now reissued by World In Sound), but “Etcetera” was one of the first albums from Peru I did hear. While collectors raved about this (expensive and rare) one, but because I didn’t feel anything typical Peruvian on this album, in the beginning I wasn’t too keen on looking much further into the Peruvian scene, because also the few other ‘60s and early ‘70s albums I had heard didn’t seem to add much more, but luckily I persevered. But already from the beginning I agreed it has a very strong opener called “Someday”, completely ‘60s psych styled, even without crossover ideas. It is a catchy song with power, and with some convincing following up parts, starting with a great Hammond organ building up the mood for the song, before a rhythmical guitar melody introduces the song, while the middle theme has also some great electric guitar, and attractive bass underlining the organ. Also “Mary Ann” after that, a ‘60s slower tempo ballad in English style is equally attractive. While the organ is still there, with the bass touches here and there, it is especially the harmony vocals in two rhythms over each other that make the mood complete. On the next part, a Latin rhythm (conga and drums) the guitar improvises a bit on a funky organ repetition, before this concludes with fuzz bass, backwards guitar and an instrumental conclusion on what was the song, a rather progressive approach in just a few minutes. “I’m a Nig(g)er” is the next strong bluesy rock song, a complaint from a black man who was send to jail. After this the next couple of songs of ’60 psychpop seem to add little to the existing British and American scene, but after a various listens I started to appreciate them better. Also these have the same elements, but are just calm expressions, with just here and there effects and fine lyrics that reveal themselves after a few listens.
More recently Repsychled contacted the group and asked if they had any leftover material, and they did have some 54 minutes of music recorded between 1967 and 1970, mostly coming from rehearsals. These tracks sound mostly more bluesy, jam-like and are rough try-out versions, and don’t have that compact creativity of the previously mentioned ‘60s styled second album, but are more one step further into late ‘60s smoked live jamming mode, a bit more into harder rock. The not too good sound quality (without hiss however) makes the music more lazy or less dynamic than I think it could have been. Especially the “Glue” tracks, “Bahia” and "The World Full Of Nuts" show the bluesy psych live energy best, of which I think the last two show the best result. From more rehearsal kind of settings, for me it was “Trouble Child” that I think was the most interesting song. Another fine addition is the EP version of "The Sand Man" (also not in too good preserved condition). One of the last bonus tracks are an unreleased song showing the sound in between The New Juggler Sound and Laghonia, with a for me too much distortion to bear.
Alex Abad will play with El Polen a few years later. Laghonia after a while started to turn their music style into something much softer. When singer Carlos Guerrero joined the band with Saul Cornejo now focusing on lead and rhythm guitars, this new formation changed name once more, and became We All Together (a 60s styled group who released two, now reissued, albums, of which I have not had the chance yet to check them from beginning to end. I assume they are rather good, typical harmony driven Beatlesque styled pop, and are amongst the better Peruvian pop albums from those days).
