From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Mexican rock music
Mexican rock music
However, after the substantial success of Mexican-
American guitarist Santana in the United States in the
late 1960s, a large number of bands sprang up, especially
in Mexico City. Most of these bands sang in both Spanish
and, with foreign commercial exposure in mind, English.
Mexican and Chicano rock has crossed into other Hispanic
groups like José Feliciano and Lourdes Rodriguez of Puer-
to Rican descent.
Important bands of this period were Enigma, Kalei-
doscopio, El Tarro de Mostaza, El Ritual, Peace and Love,
Ciruela, The Spiders, Love (El Amor), Three Souls in My
Mind, Toncho Pilatos, Los Dug Dug’s, El Epilogo, La Semil-
la del Amor, Love Army, Tinta Blanca, La Revolución de
Emiliano Zapata, La Tribu, 39.4, La Division del Norte,
Bandido, and Cosa Nostra.
Early years
Rock activity at this time in Mexico took place in either
Mexico City and the nearby area or in northern cities
such as Mexicali, Monterrey, Nuevo Laredo, and Ciudad
Juárez, and Tijuana, whose proximity to the United States
resulted in more exposure to American sounds.
Rock, as elsewhere, became tied with the youth revolt
Santana of the 1960s. Many Mexican rock stars became involved
in the counterculture movement. The three-day Festival
Mexican rock music often referred to in Mexico as
music, Rock y Ruedas de Avándaro, held in 1971, was organized
rock nacional ("national rock"), originated in the 1950s in the valley of Avándaro near the city of Toluca, a town
with covers of standards by Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley neighboring Mexico City, and became known as "The
and The Everly Brothers, among others, bands such as Mexican Woodstock".
Los Rebeldes del Rock, Los Locos del Ritmo, Los Crazy In that rock festival, nudity, open sex, drug use, pro-
Boys, Los Nómadas, and Javier Bátiz soon arose with orig- fanity/ obscenity, and the presence of the American flag
inal compositions, often in English. The group "Los Nó- so scandalized conservative Mexican society that the
madas" was one of the first racially-integrated bands of government imposed cultural curbs in Mexican pop mu-
the 1950s. Their lead guitarist Bill Aken (Adopted son sic on a temporary basis. The festival, intended to emu-
of Mexican movie actress Lupe Mayorga, said adoption late Woodstock and Altamont, was never expected to at-
making Aken the cousin to Ritchie Valens) wrote most tract the masses it did, and the government had to evac-
of their original material, including the raucous "Donde- uate stranded attendees en masse at the end of the festi-
Donde," and co-wrote the material for their "Sounds Of val.
The Barrio" album that is still being sold by various In- During the President Luis Echeverría’s administra-
ternet web sites. Their 1954 recording of ’She’s My Babe’ tion, the Mexican government tried to win back the
was the first top 40 ’R & B’ recording by a Latino band. In country’s legitimacy through populist, leftist-oriented
the southwest U.S. Spanish guitar rhythms and Mexican programmes. Most things that could possibly be connect-
musical influences may have inspired some of the mu- ed to the counterculture or student protests was side-
sic of American musicians Ritchie Valens, Danny Flores lined on public airwaves by the powers that be, who
(of The Champs), Sam the Sham, Roy Orbison and later, feared a repeat of the student protests of 1968, the very
Herb Alpert. Initially, the public exhibited little interest same event which the new government denounced. But,
in them, because of media attention paid to La Ola Inglesa most Mexican rock bands sang and criticized the admin-
(British Invasion). istration in general and, more specifically, corruption,
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Mexican rock music
poverty and persistent social inequalities taken place and thus he is considered the most influential exponent
through Mexican history. of both rock urbano and música rupestre.
Few bands survived the curbs; though the ones that Other notable bands: Banda Bostik, Sur 16, Tex-Tex,
did, like Three Souls in My Mind (later El Tri), remained Interpuesto. The racially-integrated group "Los Nó-
popular due in part to their adoption of Spanish for their madas" was one of the few to survive for decades and
lyrics, and also as a result of a dedicated following. As would stay together until well into the 1980s. They were
the hippie trend waned c. 1973, many Mexican bands often called into recording sessions to back up Latino
inclined themselves to progressive rock and hard rock. artists such as Freddy Fender. Their final recording ses-
During the seventies there was a surge of many new sion was in early 1990 and when Chico Vasquez died sev-
bands but there was very little support from the music eral months later, the group disbanded.
industry towards producing original rock music,and the
bands suffered from it and had to limit themselves to
perform in hoyos fonqui. Representatives of this period
Metal scene
were: Perro Fantastico, Mara, Vox Populi, Stray Cat, Rock Since the 1960s hard rock had been assimilated by several
Moviloy and many more. Perro Fantastico a band from groups, like the aforementioned Los Dug Dug’s and El Ri-
the east of Mexico City (Ciudad Nezahualcoyotl) created tual, and later by others like Náhuatl, Nuevo México and
rock music singing in Spanish and English, formed by the Bloody Rock. During the following decade it continued
brothers Jose Luis and Jaime Francisco González (guitar to exist in forms of heavy blues, which was an authentic
and bass) with Guillermo Avalos (drums) and Arturo Fa- underground movement, which peaked in the late 1970s
jardo (rhythm guitar) and played among the other bands when the Hoyos Funky came to notoriety around 1977.
in places like Salon Chicago, Macumba, el Herradero and Groups like Ramses and La Cruz are veterans of the
other places until the band disbanded around 1978. Dur- era and were some of the first to be labeled as "heavy
ing the seventies bands also performed in high schools, metal", but then again it was not until the 1990s that
universities and other places. Many others followed or bands like Transmetal, Next, Lvzbel and Semefo contrib-
continued during the eighties. uted to the scene with original approaches, when the
most radical forms of the genre like death metal and
grindcore were fully digested. Today the metal scene is
Música rupestre scene populated by such groups as Brujeria, Asesino, and Dis-
Since the late 1960s, there existed poets that sang with gorge.
acoustic guitars and played in the then prosperous café The early bands were followed by myriads of other
cantante scene. These forums showcased the folkloric groups, that exist in an evergrowing underground move-
music that came from South America, specially from Peru ment of sports arenas weekend concerts all over the
and Chile. Performers like Víctor Jara, Violeta Parra, Inti country.
Illimani, Los Folkloristas and local Óscar Chávez among
many others denounced in their songs the atrocities of
the military juntas, all of which experimented even
Melting pot: Chopo Bazaar
worse repression than those in Mexico during the In 1980 an unprecedented event took place: The National
Tlatelolco incident, that governed most of the countries University of Mexico UNAM, through one of its cultural
from Nicaragua to Tierra del Fuego, and curiously the departments, invited the public in general to bring over
cafes cantantes thrived, as long as nothing was overtly their L.P. records and participate in trading them with
critical of the Mexican government in general. other attendants. The gathering place was The Museo
The scene eclipsed by the early 1980s, but several mu- Universitario del Chopo, (popularly known as "Museo del
sicians like Rockdrigo, sometimes nicknamed "the Mex- Chopo") located in the heart of Mexico City, every Satur-
ican Bob Dylan" developed an own Mexican folk style, day morning.
which came to be known as ’Música Rupestre’. Later on For the first time since Avándaro rock musicians and
they were dubbed ’Los Urbanos’, because although they record collectors had the opportunity to meet each other
played acoustic guitars, the themes of their lyrics re- and exchange records, which created a collective consci-
vealed the adverse conditions the working class had to ence about rock and subculture in general that neverthe-
face in the big cities, and blues forms were then incorpo- less had existed but did not have a "proper" site to devel-
rated in their compositions. When El Tri made an elec- op. In the beginning the trading took place inside the fa-
tric rendition of Rockdrigo’s ’Metro Balderas’ the fusion cilities of the museum, but by the end of the year it could
of rock and música rupestre was consummated. not contain an evergrowing crowd interested in finding
Many others had continued to surface, but Rockdri- records that were otherwise impossible to get from the
go’s untimely death during the earthquake of 1985 in established outlets, and the trading had become selling in
Mexico City skyrocketed his already legendary status, many cases, where commerce sharks took advantage of
the incipient new market for rock "rarities".
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Mexican rock music
So the gathering extended to the street right in front cro Chips. Mexican pop bands like Timbiriche, Pandora,
of the museum, and several stands were erected, trans- and Flans as well as Spanish pop bands like Olé-Olé dom-
forming all the affair in a tianguis, a kind of street bazaar. inated the airwaves.
Despite this the record trading was still the main attrac-
tion, but other problems emerged. The resident neigh-
bors of the museum saw how their calm Saturday morn-
Monterrock
ing became disturbed by a menacing motley crowd, that Starting in the 90s, Monterrey, Nuevo León has witnessed
now included punks, new wavers, hippies, rastafaris, and the birth of several bands that have become internation-
every other extravagant people that found could express ally acclaimed. Their genres vary considerably. Bands in-
themselves freely at the weekly gathering, and as said be- clude Plastilina Mosh, COhETICA, Zurdok, Kinky, El Gran
fore, met others with the same likings and inclinations, Silencio, Jumbo, Panda, Genitallica, Heavy metal band
but with eventual sneaking inside the surrounding build- "IRA". The song "Los Oxidados" by Plastilina Mosh opens
ings to smoke a joint, or worse. the 2005 movie Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Kinky performed at the
Soon the government tried to ban the tianguis, and 2004 edition of the Coachella Music and Arts Festival in
as a matter of fact, the museum had already closed its Indio, California, along with Radiohead, The Cure and
doors to the whole event, stating that it or the National The Killers. Monterrey has recently earned the nickname
University "had nothing to do with the current state of "Monterrock", and is considered the musical capital of
affairs". They had created a monster, and it had grown so Mexico’s current rock scene. A few of the most popular
out of hand, that now it was on its own, and was being live music venues in Monterrey include Arena Monter-
put down, like in the old days. But now the participants rey, Auditorio Coca-Cola, Cafe Iguana, Ibex Rockbar,
knew each other well, and the "heads" of the tianguis or- McMullen’s and Uma Bar, all located in the Barrio An-
ganized themselves, and as a group presented a proposi- tiguo section of the city.
tion to the local government dependency, offering reli-
able and uncompromising security, and most important,
a permanent fee.
Pop rock
However, the officials were reluctant, and between
1982 and 1989 the "Chopo"(as it was now known)
changed locations no less than six times, from parks to
parking lots to faculty gardens, always because of pres-
sure from officials. And against all odds, it was still grow-
ing.
Finally, since 1990 it has been taking place on a street
behind the Buenavista Train Station, not three blocks
away from the original ’Museo del Chopo’ location. From
the original one hundred people that began attending in
1980, it is estimated that more than ten thousand people
visit the tianguis every week. From the original record
trading, it now displays all kinds of clothing, posters,
movies, handicrafts, magazines, books, instruments, and Maná performing in Southern California.
all paraphaernalia related to the subculture, and rock in
general. In the 1990s and 2000s, a number of performers have
There have been interesting social studies about the attained international renown, including pop-rock acts
Tianguis Cultural del Chopo (the official name), and peo- such as Gloria Trevi, Ana Sidel, Café Tacuba, Fobia,
ple from around the world have marveled at display of Caifanes (now Jaguares), Julieta Venegas, ska band
such intense variety of subculture, when they have had Maldita Vecindad, and synth-pop group Mœnia. Control
the opportunity to watch it first hand. The Chopo has Machete, Delasónica and Molotov explore rap/rock fu-
been a launching platform for many artists of different sion, with lyrics containing social commentary mixed
disciplines (not only rock music) to the world. with urban vulgarity. The most popular Mexican rock
group during this period was Maná, which has sold over
The mid-eighties 22 million albums worldwide.[1]
Mexican Rock immediately fell prey to the British Inva-
sion of the early 1980s. Spanish rock bands like Hom- Present
bres G, Mecano, Radio Futura and La Unión took over The 2000s also saw the emergence of a new generation
the spotlight. Mexico responded with bands like Caifanes, of Mexican alternative and indie rock musicians. Alterna-
Maná, Ritmo Peligroso, Botellita de Jeréz, El Tri and Mi- tive groups such as Panda, División Minúscula, Zoé and
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Mexican rock music
Insite have received mainstream success in Mexico and
throughout Latin America.
References
The Indie music scene in Mexico has produced bands [1] [1]
such as Porter, Austin TV, Los Dynamite, Chikita Vio-
lenta, Bengala, and Hello Seahorse!, which often write
lyrics in English and have toured alongside American in-
External links
die rock bands throughout Latin America and the United • Mexican rock at Last.fm
States. • List of bands that play Mexican rock at rockeros.net
Popular electronic music and synth-pop groups in-
clude Belanova, Sussie 4, Hocico, Amduscia and The
Nortec Collective.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mexican_rock_music&oldid=464575839"
Categories:
• Mexican styles of music
• Rock en Español
• Rock music by nationality
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