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Originally Posted by DJ Rick
I'm not sure how Ss came to know about Los Llamarada, but he did convince the band to send him the master cassette of this boombox-recorded album, which he pressed.
There's an interesting discussion going on at Terminal Boredom with Ss about the Mexican scene in general, and why it's strange that we Americans don't hear of much in the way of punk and experimental or otherwise more overtly subversive music coming from Mexico...especially compared to places like Brazil that are so far from our borders. A theory that's been thrown out there is that Mexico's government has been repressive to a point that such expressions have been deterred or crushed. Another is about how punk culture was not exposed to Mexicans, and therefore Mexico is 15 years behind the curve of adopting or becoming inspired by punk and all its predecessors.
Since you live there and obviously know the music better than us, I'd like to know what you think...
http://terminal-boredom.com/forums/i...p?topic=5065.0 |
hmmm...i don't have much time right now, i'll read the discussion later on and post what i think.
the government thing is a half truth, after avandaro (the 1971 music festival that was basically mexico's answer to both woodstock and altamont) the gorvernment had some stupid repressive mentality towards rock and live music; however, records were pressed and sold even though advertising or radio play was minimilized to nullification. basically, you could be in a band and play and even get signed and have your records pressed and distributed, but getting the word out was tough, few bands from the 70's survived and now, their records are very hard to find...there's tons of great bands who issued one album then got lost.
another factor, especially in the 70's, was that mexico is a very anglophile country; to this day, people prefer crap from england (and i mean crap like robbie williams and keane) over crap from the u.s.; in the 70's, especially the early part, the music from england exported here was prog rock and, since it was underground, hard to find music, emerson, lake and palmer and yes and marillion were like the stooges and the mc5 here, the blueprint for rocking out. a lot of bands were just into emulating as much as possible this, having keyboard solos and whatnot.
punk did come to mexico, but only the more shallow part of it, punks started creeping out trying to look like the sex pistols and the exploited but also trying to sound exactly like them and acting like they thought they did, by getting into drugs. so there was no scene, just reenactors, it wasn't until the late 80's when the crust punk contingent actually got up and started playing music and releasing tapes, etc. but by then it was a little late for punk.
another problem is centralism, the country is based, culturally, as revolving around the city, people want to come live here and work and earn money instead of spending time in the countryside or provincia; the focus is always here, and the record industry is based here, so it spoils bands with false ideas of careerism. in the nineties, the freshest commercial shit was coming from monterrey (where los llamarada hail) and now, there's this huge cross-genre scene in guadalajara that's amazing (i hope to be able to put together a regional comp focused on guadalajara in the future) because the heat is not there, there's no preassure to be the next whatevers and be on mtv, they just play what they like; there's also bands from la paz like maniqui lazer doing crazy spazz punk shit with a twist and i also know this band from zacatecas called expedición a las estrellas who are a post rock ensemble whose sounds range from really delicate to burzum like heavy.
basically, there's tons of bands and artists but there's little to no mutual support, lots of envy and crap going around, clubs get shut down for the most part and the ones that stand usually want to stiff bands with "pay to play" policies. also, until fairly recently, we were not used to many bands from abroad coming to play, usually just a handful and that would be it, so culturally, people are not used to going out and watch a band, for the most part is a chore because, most bands here suck and are just interested in catching a break and be signed or something.
but, things are looking up, more activity involving music has started, more bands from many genres are coming here and the real punk spirit, which has crept up little by little since it's impact has been more individual than collective (which i think is an advantage) and now, more diy gigs are starting to get organized, indie labels are releasing stuff (right now, they are mostly net labels, but stuff will be pressed and released pretty soon) and quality bands are starting all over the place, it's really exciting actually.
another factor is that difusion has been scarce, mainstream media virtually ignores anything that's not famous already and don't want to gamble on stuff a lot of people don't know about. people have to do stuff to get this thing going, which reminds me i need to update my blog really soon.
i'll read that discussion tomorrow, probably.