Photo of Mexican Tiki Bar!

Look at this amazing record album I picked up at a garage-sale this morning. It's by a Mexican band called "Grupo Guerrero" and shows the band members on the steps of a very cool tiki bar.

The record was "Hecho en Mexico" and the back of the record states that the band hails from Acapulco. It is also signed by all the members and has the inscription; "To our Susy with a Lot of Love. From Acapulco".

I'm assuming this is probably an Acapulco tiki bar in the photo. Could it be the enigmatic AKU TIKI, whose coaster is on page 121 of the BOT?

The music is a kind of disco/salsa from the 70s, heavy on the synthesizer.

Sabu

[ Edited by: Sabu The Coconut Boy on 2003-09-17 12:15 ]

[ Edited by: Sabu The Coconut Boy 2009-06-23 16:41 ]

In a word INSANE!!!

:drink:

That Album cover is "AWESOME". What a great find Sabu! I'm jealous.

what's it sound like?

It's a pretty basic Salsa, Balada, and Bolero record from the 70s, but with a definite disco feel to it. Not a trace of Exotica. (Which makes it all the weirder.)

The funny thing is that I woke up with a fever and headache this morning and was going to throw in the towel on garage-saling. Fortunately, Doctor Z persuaded me to go anyway. If I had stayed home in bed, I would have never found this gem. What a tragedy that would have been!

Sabu

SABU Stikes Again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cool find Sabu. The name of the album is "la comezon" which means "the itch". The album is from the 70's so the main flavor of the music might be cumbia. Cumbia(colombian/afro in orgin) de-throned mambo as the popular dance and music style in Mexico around this era. The album cover has taken me back to my 70's childhhod in socal with all the weddings and parties we used to go to with my party-animal family. We used to be all pimped out in those grown-man shrunken down tux's and suits with the platform boots, cutting "un alfombra" thats's rug in Es-spanish with the "older women". Good times...

I think that's young George Foreman in the days before he started marketing his low fat grill.

Talking about the hansome fellow in the front? I agree with you.

[ Edited by: thechikitiki on 2003-03-01 20:39 ]

Sabu
Para los mejores recordo del mundo! Hey, when something this cool can dredge up my 8th grade Spanish it's gotta be cool. Good score mi amigo.

On 2003-03-01 16:50, Sabu The Coconut Boy wrote:
Could it be the enigmatic AKU TIKI, whose coaster is on page 121 of the BOT?

Seems likely..... or maybe the amazing "Mauna Loa" in Mexico City, which had a Flamingo pond in the middle...

Or perhaps The tiki ventriloquist, Tony Orlando and Dawn (Ho).

Yoooooow....

I'd just like to have a "riverboat gambler" tux like that again.

dat was cool!

[ Edited by: purple jade 2006-03-20 21:20 ]

In size 48?

[ Edited by: purple jade 2006-03-20 21:20 ]

That could be the cover for the "lost" Herb Alpert and the Tiki-juana Brass album!
:)

TikiMikey,
You might be right. If the tiki was covered with whipped cream there would be no doubt.

The '70s is filled with LP covers like this one. For about a year, I would actively try to find these things at various swap meets around L.A. County. I only have one that is Mexican, but I have about thirty that are Hawaiian. Only a few have Tiki Gods on the cover, but they all embrace that Hawaiian Hippie feel, with moustaches, hair over the ears, bell-bottoms... sometimes even bell-bottomed leisure suits! This is especially true after about 1976 -- the groups still look like Grand Funk Railroad, but there is that slight hint of Disco. That's a great find, Sabu.

Also, many of these LP covers have one of the group members smoking a cigarette!!!!

[ Edited by: purple jade 2006-03-20 21:17 ]

That is soooo freaking sweet. Oh, how I envy you Sabu, oooooooOOOOOOOOOo...

I used to have an extensive collection of lounge singer "nobody" records. I kind of idolized those guys. Bill Murray's routine used to have me rolling in the floor as a kid. One of my favorite movies is "Broadway Danny Rose". I had an alter ego back when I lived in Athens, Ga., known as "Manny Mantuso" (I made a giant foil star on an easel with my picture in the middle in a liesure suit and "APPEARING NIGHTLY". Still have a few of my old records, like (get these names) Joe Bonomo, Richie Delamore, Al Romay. "Staaaar Waaars....Nooothing buuut Staaaar Waaaars"..

Lounge Singer "Nobody" records are the greatest. The ones from the '60s and '70s often show clubs that no longer exist, too. How fun.

That's a question you don't hear too much anymore(thank god) at the ole barbershop." Over the ear?"

tHank you, that is the most beautiful record cover I have ever seen. It is my new desktop picture! Fluffy hair, bell bottoms, moustaches, oh yeah, tikis

I'll tell you, during the '90s, everything was about the 1950s & '60s -- Googie, Mods, Garage music, Surf, Exotica... all cool stuff. But, the '70s was seen as a putred time of uncool, because of Disco and Hard Rock, both of which presumably killed all things cool, when amalgamated with the Reagan '80s of Heavy Metal and New Wave.

Looking back, I find myself attracted to the strange time that was the '70s. Sex was a particluarly crazy subject in the '70s, far more free, but a bit perverse and almost demented... check out some of the '70s movies available from Something Weird Video. Issues of "Hustler" magazine included a comic strip called "Chester The Molester," which was/is far more perverted than anything Crumb has done, satire or not... Chester The Molester was the real thing, sick-O beyond recognition.

Long live moustaches... I've never had one and never will, but I enjoy '70s exploitation movies, '70s magazines (especially Rock zines, like "Who Put The Bomp!" and "Creem") and a lot of good music came out of the '70s.

It was a strange time of the counter-culture generation growing up, making changes, making comprimises, but the '70s stands as the landmark of a very weird time in American culture, and other cultures influenced by American trends, such as Country Rock, Hard Rock, Reggae, Punk (Yes, American!) and Disco. That album cover says a lot.

Check out the cover of Puka Shells by Arthur Lyman for the ultimate tiki/70s fusion. He's sporting this huge shell "medallion" necklace with a big collared shirt open to his navel and some hella swank green poly slacks.

-martin

On 2003-03-04 14:32, martiki6 wrote:
He's sporting this huge shell "medallion" necklace with a big collared shirt open to his navel and some hella swank green poly slacks.

You just described the outfit I was planning on wearing for the SF Tiki Crawl.

...SPOILER...

Hi Everybody,

I just found proof of yet another Tiki restaurant in Mexico. Two bar glasses that bear witness to the existence of the "KON-TIKI FLOATING RESTAURANT" in Ensenada. I've just posted the photos below to Mike's mug gallery.


So that now makes at least three old Mexican tiki bars that we now know about:

The Aku Tiki in Acapulco
The Mauna Loa in Mexico City
The Kon-Tiki in Ensenada

Anyone know of any others?

Sabu

Last weekend I found a postcard from the Mauna Loa in Mexico City. Here's a photo:

Sabu, thanks for letting me know there was mention of it in this thread !

What's with that flyin' monkey man standing by the lava rock wall? He'd be totally freakin me out if I was drinking in that place. The Flamingoes would make me feel like I was back home in Florida, however. I wonder if they serve drinks in onyx tiki mugs? Viva tiki!

On 2003-09-19 14:53, Kailuageoff wrote:
What's with that flyin' monkey man standing by the lava rock wall?

Having flashbacks of the Wizard of Oz?

[ Edited by: susane on 2004-01-20 06:16 ]

That ceiling is glorious! What I wouldn't give to be there...

Well BK all you need is to break out that snazzy coat of yours, some stick-on sideburns, 12lbs of polyester(ask PolyPop) and some afrosheen for that chai-nee (Soul Glo) look. Youn ganna louk ES-PECH-ALL!

"That's why I Taaake my time, very gently as I slip yo litttle panties off"-Barry White, (Let Me Love you-1978)

Hey, it looks like there is still a Mauna Loa in Mexico City (I don't know if it's the Mauna Loa) at Ave. San Jeronimo 240. Lots of modern references to it (they have a polynesian floor show, it can't be too shabby!), and none that I could find that said it was closed. I had a bit of a panic when I found that a club called Vintage opened at the same address in 1997, but then I found a website that said that Vintage is next to Mauna Loa... can anyone shed any light? Is there indeed a tiki bar open in Mexico City today, and is it the same Mauna Loa from puamana's postcard?

How far is the drive from Pasadena to Mexico City? :wink:

humhumu... i think that one's a plane trip and not a driving trip...

Drive it! It will only take a few days. But don't go alone!

Sounds like a great adventure to me! Who's with me? Anyone got any grade-a mescaline?

Vámonos, chica!!! Ándale, arriba arriba! Who needs a job, anyway???

Wait - I'll tell my students I'm going on a field trip reconnaisance mission!! Yeah, that's it!!

It's "research" for my classes!!

Señorita Formikahini

Uh oh... I'm beginning to be inspired:

2 men, a dog, and the 1st car road trip

I may have some time to kill before my job starts... I should derail this train of thought before I get myself in trouble.

On 2003-10-02 11:12, thechikitiki wrote:
Drive it! It will only take a few days. But don't go alone!

I did that trip by bus in 1993... It's only 3 days. It depends on how many chickens are packed in the luggage area.

Tres Astrellas Bus line (Tijuana) can get you there in record time...

I'm serious...

Puamana just gave me the address she has from her postcard & menu, and it's Hamburgo 172. It looks like an office building is there now. So this new Mauna Loa isn't the same as the original Mauna Loa, though I suppose it's possible that the original moved (wishful thinking?).

The menu from the Mauna Loa has some wonderful graphics, I'll try to post a photo sometime this weekend.

[ Edited by: puamana on 2003-10-03 09:50 ]

I just got word that Eli (Ely for Big Bro and Tiki Bars) did a place in Ensanada. I wonder if this was it? He also did some things in Rosarito and lived in a trailer (back in the 70's) near Puerto Nuevo. I remember it not being the city it is now. Just a few trailers back then.

I shouldn't have stolen your thunder, puamana, I'm sorry! I can't wait to see that menu.

I've got a coworker who grew up in Mexico City, and his sister still lives there. He's going to ask her if she'd be willing to go there and check it out. It's a long shot, but we'll see!