Music & Films for
Common People
100 Best Mexican Contemporary songs
60
She's A Tease
Fiebre De Jack
Summer is that fantastic time of the year when, if we're lucky to live in the correct side of the planet, we can escape to the beach, and feel the warm sun next to a lot of almost-naked bodies. Every generation has had their peculiar way to live the summertime fun and their own hymns that score that experience, but we all have been young and waiting for the summer to arrive for the fun to begin, and Fiebre de Jack is the ode to that common feeling that barely changes between one generation and the next one. She's a Tease starts this song remembering the Summer of 69', that time when Brian Adams formed his everlasting memories, and how the childs of "Aquarius" lived this fever, to later recall the summers of 79' and 89', all of them are dearly to a certain generation, and this funky tune is all about that feeling of being young and having fun, all the elements that are thrown in here make it a timeless hymn to remind us that soon the young millenials are going to go crazy in the Summer of 2019, and they'll experience the same fever we had on our days.
(Indie Rock, 2010)
59
Hello Seahorse!
Bestia
They started as just another annoyingly cheerful twee pop band, but Hello Seahorse! soon moved to darker and more interesting grounds with their second album, releasing the beast that was laying inside of those claps and smiles. But this beast is an emo beast (in the Death Cab for Cutie way, not in the My Chemical Romance sense), one that attacks not because it is aggressive by nature, but because the social anxiety it suffers makes its interactions painful for both parties involved. Denise Gutierrez (Lo Blondo, to her friends and fans), the lead singer posses one of the most powerful voices in the country, and even if her vocals shine showing her wide range, she is smart enough to don't make her voice the center of the song, she just let it be a quiet lamentation that accompanies the increscendo of the drums and the synths that show the truly dangerous side of this Bestia (spanish for Beast). It was almost the end of the emo era (finally!), but it was until then that a Mexican band could understand the poetics of young angst, and made an intelligent and complex song that stride far away of the bloody lyrics and vomited anger of other emo bands.
(Indie Rock, 2009)
58
(Pop, 2012)
Jesse Y Joy
Corre
What sets apart siblings-duo Jesse & Joy from the rest of similar soppy ballad groups in Mexico is their naivety. While other groups sound like fake syrupy basic romanticism (of the kind that just revolves around the topics "I love you / You don't love me"), Jesse and Joy Huerta still hold some credibility because you buy the ingenuity in their topics; they are not the gang of boys trying to enchant the girls, they are brother and sister supporting each other through their romantic misadventures. Even if most of the time they fall in the silly side of the spectrum (other singles of them have made analogies of love with chocolate and Superman flight), a few times they nail the experience of people who are learning to know better in love, and Corre (Run) is the perfect example of the hopeless romantic who keeps falling for the same liar, but finally decides to let go not because of own self-esteem, but because of pure exhaustion, their "Run, run, run, my love" implies that they just arrived to a point where they aren't able to move anymore; it's not empowering, but it's very honest. They might be heart-broken, but they still can count on that siblinghood between them two to keep going.
57
Cartel De Santa
La Pelotona
It's hard to find an accurate translation of what "La Pelotona" means, but in general terms is rude slang to call a curvy woman. With that in mind, many would think that the first single of rap group Cartel de Santa was a collection of sexist beats that treat women like a mere object for the pleasure of men, as we've listened once and again in the history of rap music; but daring to go beyond the title, we found a love declaration that gave voice to a segment of the population (latin rap has to do more with class than with race) that doesn't identify with the bourgeois pop songs that infests radio stations and claimed for a language more relatable with them, so this undying love promise relies heavy on showing gang lifestyle, "Many are hunting my head, but (...) I would resurrect just to be with you". Among this angsty love beats, we get some reassurance when the object of desire answers back, in a very seductive voice, giving some contrast to the whole piece. Not your typical love song, but it shows that romance means different things to different kinds of people.
(Rap, 2002)
56
(Synthpop, 2011)
Ximena Sariñana
Shine Down
After the success of her first solo album, many important people put their eyes on Ximena Sariñana: Metronomy remixed her song La Tina, and Omar Rodríguez-López (from The Mars Volta) invited her to sing in some of his projects. At that moment, Ximena decided to try the crossover with a second album almost entirely in English, and the first single, Shine Down, saw Sariñana getting out of her (very questioned) singer-songwriter role and aiming for a power pop style. Her flattened (almost joyless) voice contrasts sharply with the distorted guitar and the heavy synths, and it's edgy in a robotic rockstar way, just in the way of La Roux or Ladytron, and it's not surprise when a fabulous synth pop producer like TV on the Radio's Dave Sitek was the one in charge. In spite of the good critics of international music media and the fact that she managed to play Coachella and SXSW, the album was a selling disaster, both in the international market (too saturated for somebody with an impossible last name that includes an "ñ"?) and in the local Mexican one (too far away of what made her famous in the first place), so she decided to go back to her roots; a real shame.
55
(Indie Rock, 2006)
Los Dynamite
Frenzy
Through decades, there was a stigma that forced Mexican musicians to sing in Spanish. If you were to sing in English, it was because you already was a very well-known act that was trying its luck with a crossover to an anglo-saxon market, but always having a Spanish version of the same songs for the local market, the way that Gloria Stefan, Ricky Martin or Shakira did, but with no luck for a single Mexican act. Up until the first half of the 2000's, it was impossible to think of a Mexican band singing in English (or other language) to a Mexican public; but with the digital music revolution, it was Los Dynamite the band that came to change that way of thinking. Frenzy could easily be mistaken for a track in Franz Ferdinand's debut album, it is a solid post-punk track with a great game between the bass and the guitar, but with certain rhythm that allow people to still dance to it. Diego Solórzano delivers the lyrics about that awkward moment when a friendship starts getting sexual with an attitude that makes honor to the name of the track. It's weird how Los Dynamite came, change a lot of things in Mexican music, and suddenly disappeared, it's like if they had one mission only and were just happy with completing it.
54
Volovan feat. Ximena Sariñana
La Luna
There are times when less is much more, and La Luna (The Moon) is bare in its elements to maximize the effects they have. In the best way of indie love ballads (think Bright Eyes or Bon Iver), this song addresses the most basic feeling but twist the way it's told to don't sound too sugary. A basic bass line, a piano, and the duet between Chalo Galvan and Ximena Sariñana (as a guest female voice) are all that we can listen here, but the key element of this track is the use of pause and silence; the bass line is intermittent, sounding almost like the machine that measures the heartbeats of a dying person (or a dying love, in this case), and it's what adds the tension to the track, going for a melancholy feeling that overwhelms us. The lyrics at times walk in that fine line between sensible and corny, but the usage of the moon as a symbol saves the overall intention, and verses like "I don't want to get used to don't have you next to me" lose the syrupy intonation because there's this inexorable moon over us that will come out every night, whether there's somebody next to us to watch it or not.
(Indie Pop, 2006)
53
Le Butcherettes
Demon Stuck In Your Eye
After having changed members with every new music release, it was clear that Le Butcherettes was just Teri Gender Bender, and whoever would be joining her would be who she needs at that moment to construct her aggressive and raw poetics. In her second album, it's her producer, Omar Rodríguez López (from The Mars Volta and hundreds of side projects) who takes the bass and adds new elements to the sound of the band. Teri also has improved her guitar skills and in Demon Stuck in Your Eye we have an approach to vintage grunge that reminds us of the better moments of Hole, and it's not only in the sound, because the attitude of Teri gets very close to Courtney Love, and let's say this, even PJ Harvey at her rawest. Teri knows how to give us a wide range in her performance, and in Demon, we see hear howling, shouting and pleading, adding much more energy to a melody that is very heavy and powerful already. Teri is the demon that is stuck not only in our eye, but deep in our minds, a hurricane presence that doesn't leave anybody indifferent to her music, is a hellish charisma that Mexican (and worldwide) music needed with desperation.
(Punk Rock, 2014)
52
(Electronic, 2002)
Murcof
Memoria
Many electronic artists have played with classical music or classical instruments in their compositions with diverse results, from the greatness of Björk and Aphex Twin, to the questionable Vanessa Mae and even that obnoxious Beethoven Virus song from dance machines in shopping malls. But Fernando Corona (former member of Nortec Collective) decided to make a full symbiosis of this opposite genres, and created sound art full of textures and cold ambients. Memoria starts with sparse reverberated piano notes, and then the electronic beat, very industrial, that conducts the track appears, giving us some time to get in the aesthetic for later introducing a haunting violin that feels like a desolated mourner in the middle of a frozen tundra landscape. The overall effect of mixing this robotic noises with the solemnity of the violin is strong, being cinematic enough to create pictures in our head, and experimental enough to defy our expectations constantly over the almost six minutes of its length. Music that is this intellectual and challenging, but that at the same time has a charm that appeals to wide audiences is rare in the Mexican scene, and certainly Murcof marked a stepping stone in electronic explorations.
51
Jumbo
Cada Vez Que Me Voy
We can't think of any other latin band that has inherited that much from britpop than Jumbo, and one can see many resemblances in their music to the sound of Oasis (the introspection of their now-classic 90's Fotografía echoes the anthemic Wonderwall), but in Cada Vez Que Me Voy (Every Time that I'm Gone), we're facing a more energetic Roll With It-esque version of the band. The band knows that is not reinventing rock and roll, but what they did, along with other bands at the end of the 90's and the beginning of the 2000's was taking a full approach to a European sound but twisting it a bit and reinterpreting it for a local audience, just like Caifanes or Soda Stereo did in the 80's with the new-wave bands. But who cares where does the inspiration comes from when a song sounds this vibrant and energetic? The guitar and the battery infuse power to it, and the lyrics are delivered with confidence and elegance in this story of the partner who has a problem (depression? addiction?) but is in denial about it.