S/D: Music from Mexico

Wikepedia has a section on Mexican music where they define difference Mexican music genres such as Duranguense...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Mexico

Cafe Tacuba, absolutely. First rate, everything they've done has been worth listening to. They use a lot of different Mexican and non-Mexican genres, do a fair amount of mixing and matching. Re is generally considered their masterpiece, and it's really good, but I listen to Avalancha de Exitos (sort of a long covers EP with wildly different songs) more, and also Cuatro Caminos, their last studio release (which is very rock-y).

Monterey has had this interesting scene going on. On the one hand, you have Kinky (and some other similar groups), which started out doing electronic world dance music, and has been trying to go more US-mainstream poppy. Their s/t record is fun, though. Then there is El Gran Silencio, which is one of my favorite groups anywhere. Bizarre amalgamation of Columbian cumbia (apparently Monterey has a large Columbian immigrant community), hip-hop, raggamuffin, rock, rai, cheese, and other genres. It's great stuff. Everything they've done has been worth listening to, too. I would start with their second or third albums, Chuntaros Radio Poder and Super Riddim Internacional Vol. 1 (which are very similar).

Two excellent female singer-songwriters: Julieta Venegas and Lila Downs. Downs works a variety of traditional styles.

Lots of people love Molotov, which was sort of the Mexican Beastie Boys.

I've tried to get into Los Tigres del Norte and other contemporary corrido groups. More a labor of interest than love. Individual songs can be very affecting, but four or five of them in a row is too much. These are ballads about criminals and strivers, and lost love, usually in polka-type rhythm.

Banda -- a brass-heavy style from northern Mexico -- can be really exciting, but I can't point you to any particular artist. If you liked Beirut's Gulag Orkestar . . . that sounded like amateurish, slowed-down banda.

Of the list I know Julio Estrada, his "Chamber Music for Strings" has this work for solo viola that I really got into. It sounds like atomized strings, then the ultra delicate stroking of atoms and yet at no point does the playing sound broken down - there is this contunuity and coherence to the whole thing.

So its not very Mexican, or anything, but its coming out of there so I thought to mention.

Been meaning to check out Hilda Paredes for ages.

Also, don't forget the great and steamy charms of Paulina Rubio, the cheesy yet passionate stylings of Marco Antonio Solis, and the traditionally-funky accordion cumbia of Celso Piña.

And if you can't handle Los Tigres del Norte, then you are missing out. Start with Jefe del Jefes, their two-disc concept album. Or, perhaps, try the album where a whole bunch of awesome Mexican artists cover songs by Los Tigres.

that'd be chetes

I guess you probably have too much "integrity" to like someone like that though huh?

Her voice has a remarkably ugly tone, so much that not even postproduction hides it. Her always out of tune attempts at singing are grating. Also, I find her music uninventive and trite, nothing "interesting" about it.

Mostly, in Mexico, though, I spent time attending concerts of my musician friends, most of them composition students.

x-post: well okay then, that tells me a lot. but i have a feeling that if i lived in sao paulo that's the way it would be for me; all my friends down there are jazz and folk musicians and it'd be so exhausting keeping up with them all that i'd be like 'argh not the radio'

http://worldmusic.nationalgeographic.com/worldmusic/view/page.basic/artist/content.artist/chavela_vargas

I'm guessing that you and I probably don't have any kind of musical tastes in common. But todo es bueno.

xpost yeah, milton, La Llorona is a good song. :-)

Oh yeah, I like Chavela Vargas too.

i like el gran silencio best of all, but also love the big banda stylings of banda el recodo, the mex-rap of control machete (esp the underrated 'uno,dos:banda'), and j.venegas and molotov and cafe tacuba and enanitos verdes and all them peoples. also, yeah, duranguese, even though my favorite band in that style is from chicago! and yeah yolanda perez and los tigres even though they are californians, furthermore, there are always texas acts like intocable & freddy fender & texas tornadoes. and my favorite rock en espanol album is 'resurrection' by the chris perez band; he was selena's husband, and this album contains (he said again) an amazing spanish cover of "alone again, or"....

Not at all. Just not digging most of the recommendations at all. But then again, the first post of this thread admitted that this was a very broad question.

http://www.sequenza21.com/index.php/278#comments

"If your idea of contemporary Mexican art music is still Chavez and Revueltas, you’re so far out of date that it’s not even funny! I can’t catch you up on composers from the 50’s through the 90’s; Google will have to help you out there. Some names to explore might be Manuel Enríquez, Mario Lavista, Federico Ibarra-Groth, Marcela Rodríguez, Hilda Paredes, Hebert Vázquez, Germán Romero, Gabriela Ortíz Torres, Juan Felipe Waller, Julio Estrada, Mauricio Beltránand. (Feeling out of the loop already? Then get busy…)
Those are all fine and respected composers, surely, but where I want to take you is to an even newer fringe of younger Mexican composers and performers, experimental and electronic musicians and improvisers, who happened to have set up a loose confederation on Myspace.com. We’re talking the NEW new, musicians whose influence lists always include Ferneyhough, Lachenmann and Murail right along with my generation’s heros like Xenakis, Ligeti and Feldman; where Zorn and Merzbow are placed as equals with any of those previous names; and where electronic and digital means are are taken for granted as stock-in-trade, right along with all the traditional instruments."

Go to the link for more (although I'm not much of a Zorn fan so this may not be my thing, plus how "Mexican" is it, hah)

"Iván Naranjo: Composer, his 2002 string quartet Uno, played by the Arditti, was just released on a new Mode CD.
Wilfrido Terrazas: Flautist and composer, seems to be a large part of the “glue” bringing these groups of musicians together.
Isaac de la Concha: Composer, improviser, teacher, with no less than three (!!) Myspace pages, one devoted to each aspect.
Alexander Bruck Santos: Violist with a fondness for everything from Feldman to free improv.
Adnán Márquez-Borbon: Saxophonist and improviser.
With a number of other musicians (who you’ll find listed in their personnel of the pages), this posse does duty in one or more of the following experimental ensembles:
Generación Espontánea
Ensamble Áspero
ArtoEnsamble
Colectivo Kaoss

Los Enanitos Verdes: Them I don't get at all. I bought their most recent album at the Tower liquidation sale for $5, and I couldn't bring myself to listen to it a second time. There was absolutely nothing on it I wanted to hear again. I don't have that kind of reaction to hardly anything.

Probably not what Merlindude is looking for but "Maria Daniela y su Sonido Lasser" are ace. A bit like a cross between Le Tigre and Peaches doing Hi-NRG. Their parent band is Titan, who've been around for ages and also worth checking. Lots of interesting stuff on the "Nuevos Ricos" label.

Plastilina Mosh (from Monterrey) started out as Beastie Boys imitators ("Nino Bomba") but have evolved into something more interesting. Worth checking out.

Spent sometime on myspace yesterday listening to these people -- basically Zorn doesn't come round till you go on that saxophonists' page, and then only some of his stuff has some of that -- he quite likes his electroacoustic improv, too.

There is one piece by the arto ensemble that basically reminded me of the Dead C -- of their tiredness, I suppose. One Bordon track had those Mego-ish submerged sounds. My fave out fo all of this so far ws Collective Kaoss 10 min laptop noise thingy - cpl of unexpected sounds, cpl of false endings as I now dimly recall - even then I ended up with a feeling I'd be bored by a second listen. Aspero seemed stuck on the sounds they were making; Espontanea ws improv and that one track had lots of energy, but you do wonder whether that'll all go in a cpl of years as they get bored of the applause. Naranjo's and Terrazas are ok-ish, I suppose it's gd to hear all this if you can't get performances of Lachenmann or whatever. I think the former probably needs time and distance (as young-ish composers often do) to distill whatever they've learnt into something of their own. Ivan may even have to discard all of that. Usually I do look out for any composers who are stretching the capabilities of their instruments, etc., or some kind of inventiveness on the instrumentation, or some weird combination where you think there'll be some remarkable payoff at a concert, and I couldn't hear that. Whereas that Argentinian composer that Steve picked out last week definetely sounded more promising in that respect.

Although of course this is all based on samples.

Saw the 'radical' word a cpl of times w/out any interest shown at engaging in anything from their own background. Are noises enough?

Here's more cut & pasted pr on what they're up to (and what their lyrics are all about):

Set to Take Place March 23 In Las Vegas, The BMI Awards Gala Will Coincide With The Planned March 27th Release Of Los Tigres Del Norte’s New Album - Which Will Continue The Group’s Role As The Leading Voice Of The Immigrant Community By Addressing Topics Such as The Immigration Marches, The Planned Border Fence & The Recent Mexican Election.

Look For Los Tigres To Preview Their New Album With February Tour Dates In NEW YORK, WASHINGTON DC & ATLANTA.

The Atlanta show was on the 10th

Thanks to all!

great also: GRUPO EXTERMINADOR, which is like Los Tigres except funnier and smuttier-minded and more self-consciously parodic. jenni rivera's new one sounds like it's going to be a banda classic, and i like the new yolanda perez more every time i hear it. which is a lot.

Tacuba are back in the studio at present, and working with Santaolalla again thank God (I thought Cuatro Caminos was basically a Spanish-language Flaming Lips album; I fucking hated it and I hope they've fired their drummer).

It's mostly all norteno which can kind of wear you out if you're not a cowboy hat wearing dancer ($6.50 a beer, $60 a ticket, $10 to park--there were some folks there with kids in strollers for this big night out with the legends). They mixed in some boleros, waltzes, sappy ballads and rockish numbers though. The sound system had the bass and drums booming, and the accordion was well mic'ed also, but you couldn't hear the acoustic guitar-like bajo sexto.

http://universalmusica.com/TronodeMexico/Biography

Duranguese group Trono de Mexico just did a big DC show. The gig got no crossover attention--The promoter has a Spanish language facebook site I found (where he mentioned advertising the gig on a Spanish language AM radio station).

3ballmty have a debut album coming out, but it sounds like their attempt to go pop isn't going to quite hit the mark (not for me anyway--I'm less sure of how they will do with sales):

http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=8628413

I was all excited about buying this, but after listening to these clips and having heard the title track before, I'm not so sure.

(Anyway, unexpected medical bill today so I am probably not going to be buying any music for a while to come.)