Music & Films for
Common People
Mexican music through the times has been very exciting. Home to the world famous mariachi and to several other folk styles that represent the cultural richness of a country with more than a thousand years of history. But Mexico also jumped into modern music and after the psychedelia of Santana, it experienced a golden era of rock music during the 80s and the 90s with the movement "Rock en tu idioma" (Rock in your own language). But what has the new millennium to offer in Mexican music? Here's our selection of tracks that best embodies why Mexico is still a great country for all kinds of music. (This selection takes into account original songs produced after the year 2000 by artists born in Mexico (or with Mexican citizenship), or bands based in Mexico with Mexican members, no matter the language of the song).
100
(Rock, 2005)
Zoé
DEAD
To ponder the importance of Zoé in Mexican music, we just need to say that the term "Generation Zoé" is very popular to call a certain group. Even if that adjective was used initially to call the young people from a middle-low class who are condemned to subemployment but don't question the political situation of the country and deludes themselves with songs about cosmic forces, it went largely to represent a wider generation that enjoyed latin rock.
But Zoé indeed set a very particular poetry where the planets and the universe have a large influence in human emotions and vice versa, "the blue membrane of your eyes fulminating time and space". For Zoé, love is a chaotic force than disrupts in the universe harmony, but it's also the communion between two human souls what can bring the balance back to the cosmos.
With such statements Zoé managed to find greater success after leaving the big record company that represented them and going truly indie. Dead is the main reason on why The Room is one of the best selling EPs in Mexican history.
99
(Indie Pop, 2007)
Ximena Sariñana
Mediocre
Ximena Sariñana started her career as a child actor in Mexican soap operas and in the soppy films directed by her father, so when she started to pursue recognition as a musician, not many people took her seriously. But just the opening song on her debut album is enough to shut a lot of mouths. Mediocre mixes rock riffs with subtle jazz elements, and a melancholic Sariñana starts singing about a lover that left her thorn and with with self depreciation. Mediocre sounds like the mellow poetry of Norah Jones clashing with the high-voltage rage of Fiona Apple, but also inherits the vast experience of Mexican female singer-songwriters that came before her. Above all, Mediocre evolves painting feelings in different shades, and leaves us feeling both the pity and the rage of an unrequited love, and stating very clear that we certainly need to think it twice before calling Sariñana a "mediocre" musician.
98
(Indie Rock, 2014)
Camilo Séptimo
No Confíes En MÍ
The title of this single translates as "Don't trust me", and you can ask yourself if you want to trust a band who name themselves (Camilo VII) with a pun for a Spanish singer from the 70s (Camilo Sesto, or Camilo VI). But the band name is the only questionable decision of this band that opened for Kings of Leon on their Mexican shows. No Confíes En Mi is full of dark atmospheres and seductive textures that pretty much remind us of Foals' math rock; the sexy male voice whispers that "You still have the chance to don't get to know me more", but it's too late since the first riffs of the song already have us hooked in their sound and craving for more, and the addictive chorus sticks in your head for a long time. We certainly can trust that Camilo Séptimo will be one of the bands that will keep pushing the boundaries of Mexican indie rock.
(Rock/Pop, 2002)
97
Volovan
Ella Es Azul
The color blue in music is mostly associated with melancholy and sadness, so when a song called "She is Blue" sounds this fresh and upbeat, the first image that comes to you is of a sunny day in the sea. And just like The Beach Boys, who are clearly a big influence for Volovan, in Ella Es Azul, we are facing pure summertime fun, between kisses in the sand and bodies that smell to coconut sunscreen. It's a simple song about a summer love with no more pretensions than make you feel good and have your feet dancing, but the execution of the guitar riffs is precise and has the electricity of The Strokes in their most pop moments. It's difficult to admit that Volovan was a point of influence for the emo bands that came a few years after them, but on the bright side they also open a path that great indie bands like Little Jesus and Torreblanca keep exploring.
96
(Indie Rock, 2005)
Los Dynamite
T.V.
Los Dynamite was one of the first bands in Mexico to break free from any regional sound and fully embrace the post-punk revival movement of bands like Franz Ferdinand and Bloc Party. That very anglo saxon sound was a novelty for Mexican bands and they gained great popularity with indie audiences that hoped for local bands that could take Mexican music closer to the newest trends. T.V. had a specific catchiness that made it danceable, but at the same time it was very unpredictable and complex, and it was in English, so when it was included in a TV ad for a famous telephone company and went hugely popular, there were no ties that could relate this band to any other in the national scene. TV was huge in refreshing the panorama for indie bands, the electronic touches that made them sound like New Order or Daft Punk gave a quirckiness to the final product and comes to remind us of a time of underdeveloped social media (MySpace, damn).
95
Pambo
Perdón
Mexican pop tends to be very straight-forward and over dramatic, so most pop singers and groups tend to go around the same romantic topics again and again, but Pambo is not like most pop singers. Openly queer, Alejandra Ruíz always went against the common standards in appeareance for a female pop star. Her second single Perdón (Sorry) is a love ballad that asks forgiven to a former lover to whom she's still attached, but unlike most pop songs on that topic, she doesn't promises eternal undying love, the voice in this song is a woman that admits "searching for your kiss in other lips", and then keeps brief encounters with the person she is singing to, because lust is the main reason that keeps them together. A woman expressing herself sexually in that way, frank without over sexualizing herself, in a pop song in spanish is very unusual (maybe the only other was Alejandra Guzmán in the 90s), and the entire song drips humanity and real passion, so we tremble when she defiantly asks "If there's nothing left and you're not coming back, why are you still touching me?".
(Pop, 2007)
94
(Synthpop, 2011)
Pau Y Amigos
Fiesta Permanente
Like most latin indie musicians nowadays, Paulina Lasa has been attached to a lot of different projects with diverse degrees of success; and even when now she seems very steady as the keyboardist and vocals in Haciendo el Mal, we still wonder why she stopped on her solo project, Pau y Amigos, that was her most fun pop side. In Fiesta Permanente (Permanent Party), Paulina is playful with the synths, almost in a childish way, so this shiny melody is soft dance that would make Robyn or Passion Pit very jealous, and when the lazerray sound effects appear, it's impossible to don't be dancing. This party takes us to the exterior space and back in less than five minutes.
93
(Folk/Electronic, 2014)
Centavrvs Feat. Denise Gutiérrez
Por Eso
A project that started as a tribute to 100 years of the Mexican Revolution that mixed the music of that time, the "corridos", with electronic and avant-garde touches, soon proved that could have life beyond the experimentation phase. In Por Eso, Centavrvs approaches mexican cumbia, with a slow and melodic rhythm but with electronic hints that keep the track moving forward, and for the vocal duet, they recruited Denise Gutiérrez, the lead singer of Hello Seahorse! and her outstanding soprano voice, and on turns, she and Demián Gálvez exchange passionate lyrics of a sexual encounter, and their exchange is like a seductive dance that invites us to grab a partner and join the celebration, dancing very close one to the other. Por Eso sounds like the deeply mystical and sensual Mexico at the same time that moves a traditional style to new experimentations.
92
(Indie Rock, 2015)
Rey Pila
Alexander
After the dissolution of Los Dynamite, the mastermind behind that band, Diego Solórzano, moved onto a new project, Rey Pila, which made his intentions of playing in the international ground much clearer, and certainly he moved in the right direction since Julian Casablancas from The Strokes signed Diego's new band to his label. Alexander is rough guitars and shiny synths, that immediately evoke David Bowie's 80s glam style, a take on new wave that is both catchy and inventive, and when Solórzano says that he wants to "go wild for a while", we certainly want to be part of that fun, and we can imagine it as the preparation of a big night out in the city. In general terms, the second album from Rey Pila establish how well prepared are indie rock Mexican bands to be in the same league of the most important acts nowadays. Will there be other bands willing to leave the safe zone sometime soon?
91
(Rock, 2006)
Chetes
Completamente
Gerardo Garza was 13 years old when he joined Zurdok, one of the most important Mexican rock bands in the end of the 90s, so by the time he was 27 and released his first solo album, he was still very young but had a great deal of experience by playing in the most important festivals of Latin America. Garza never denied that The Beatles were one of his main influences, but for his solo career he gave a twist to his style and paired with Ken Coomer, from Wilco, and infused his guitar and his piano with touches of country music, so Completamente (Totally) is the poetic cavilations of an urban cowboy on alternate realities and how in spite of "having it all totally, everything seems like so little". Even when a lot of critics came after the change that was leaving the distortions and experimentations of Zurdok for something more mellow, it's still a very complex approach to another side of Garza, it's certainly the softest rock, but also the most intelligent pop.