Eddie Lebron - Ghetto Records Presents

Ghetto Records Presents brings Eddie Lebron and Orquesta Suave back into circulation as the opening release in Now-Again Records’ catalogue-wide reissue programme devoted to Joe Bataan’s Ghetto Records. The album combines heavy salsa and Latin soul, led by Puerto Rico-born pianist Eddie Lebron, and has a particular historical importance: it was the record that launched the Ghetto label. This new edition restores an album that, like the rest of the imprint’s small catalogue, spent decades out of print.

Joe Bataan created Ghetto Records as a route towards independence and creative control after his experiences in the music business. In the supplied notes, Bataan describes the label as a stepping stone in his wider journey and an experience that taught him how to deal with adversity and think beyond the limits being placed around him. The project was ambitious but short-lived. Ghetto Records folded not long after it began, leaving only seven albums in its discography and turning the original releases into difficult-to-find documents of New York Latin music.

Now-Again’s programme revisits those records with Bataan’s oversight and input. The reissues are licensed from him and are accompanied by a sixteen-page oversized book written by Pablo Yglesias, setting the music within the story of Bataan’s life and the independent label he established. For Eddie Lebron’s album, that context sits alongside a compact seven-track programme moving from songs such as “Fui Sincero” and “Yo Te Lo Dedico” to “Eddie's Guaguanco”, “Pena” and “Rico Son”.

Released on vinyl by Now-Again Records on 25 September 2026, Ghetto Records Presents offers a newly available edition of a foundational Ghetto Records title, bringing its blend of salsa and Latin soul back to LP alongside the wider history of the label that first issued it.