page_title: Tanguito
section_title: Influence and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Tanguito / Influence and legacy
caption_attribution_description: Tumba de Tanguito en el Cementerio de San Martín
context_page_description: José Alberto Iglesias, better known as Tango or its diminutive Tanguito, was an Argentine rock singer-songwriter. Born into a working class family from western Greater Buenos Aires, he began his career in the early 1960s as the lead singer of the nueva ola group Los Dukes, which recorded two singles released on label Music Hall. In the late 1960s, he became a leading figure in the countercultural underground of Buenos Aires, a scene that gave birth to Argentine rock, the earliest incarnation of Spanish-language rock. Tanguito is celebrated for co-writing Los Gatos' hit "La balsa", that catapulted the burgeoning rock nacional into massive popularity in the summer of 1967-68. This success led to a contract with RCA Victor which soon ended after the little impact of the 1968 single "El hombre restante". Tanguito later worked for Mandioca, Argentine rock's first independent record label founded by producers Jorge Álvarez and Pedro Pujó in 1968.
  In the early 1970s, his amphetamine addiction worsened and deeply damaged his career and personal life. He was arrested on several occasions and later hospitalized at the Hospital Borda, where he was subjected to electroshock therapy.
context_section_description: Argentine rock was to become a seminal influence in rock en español; Tanguito provided the first real hit of that movement as well as many sketches that were freely used by others. His brief but brilliant trajectory is recalled by many elder statesmen of Argentine rock as a main force in the early days, and as a sad remainder of the damage that drugs can wreak. Argentine author Miguel Grinberg, who was involved in that scene, has said  that Tanguito influenced the transition of Argentine rock from English to Spanish more than anybody else.
  In 1973, Tanguito's Mandioca recordings were published in an LP album named Tango. This album was released again in 1982 and 1993. The album's rendition of La Balsa has a spoken word introduction by Manal's Javier Martínez in which he repeats: "you composed La Balsa in the washroom of La Perla del Once". Martínez was in the studio for the recording but did not participate, and uttered the words for dramatic effect. The emphasis created friction with Nebbia, who felt that Mandioca was claiming Tanguito was the song's sole author. The rift subsided over time, but Nebbia remained a jealous custodian of his own rights.
  Luis Alberto Spinetta covered Tanguito's Amor de Primavera and made that song a highlight of his concerts during the late 1970s and early 1980s.
  In 1989, a television show named "Tanguito" starring Emilio Bardi was aired in the "Especiales de ATC" program on (Canal 7).
  Director Marcelo Piñeyro directed his first feature film Tango Feroz ("Fierce Tango") in 1993, which became the top-grossing movie of the year in Argentina. The movie dramatized the life of a rock singer, obviously based on Tanguito, referring to the political and social climate of Argentina in the 1960s and early 1970s. Piñeyro did not obtain permission to use Tanguito's songs in the soundtrack, and was unable to get Nebbia to help researching Tanguito's life. He took artistic license in the plot of the movie, since the real-life Tanguito was not active politically and did not comment on the events that shook Argentina such as the 1969 Cordobazo, even though his "hippie" image might have influenced his ordeals with the police. His turbulent personal life and drug-related issues were also sanitized in the screenplay.
  Spanish singer-songwriter pays tribute to Tanguito with his song of the same name "Tanguito", released originally on his 1999 album "Pensión Triana". One of the lines reads "Toma del escenario la madera necesaria, subíme de la mano y naufraguemos en tu balsa" which is Ruibal's gesture to Tanguito's song La Balsa.
caption: Tanguito is buried at General San Martín Partido cemetery of Greater Buenos Aires.
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