I avoided commenting on Josh Kun's Sunday NYT piece on the "new" Mexican indie rock scene, for a couple of reasons: 1) I don't actually know a lot of the bands (talk about feeling old and out of the loop); 2) the bands I do know are nice, but not my cup of horchata; 3) those of you who know me well probably have a good idea of at least one other reason.
The article focuses on labels like Nuevos Ricos, transnational parties like Fresa Salvaje and kitschy bands like Titán, which have sites on MySpace, sing in English (at least sometimes) equally wield guitars and turntables and are oriented to a global market. The "old guard" is now guys like Caifanes and Café Tacuba.
Anyway, noticed the following comment from Mariluz (Gonzalez?) at the end of a NY Remezcla blog entry on the article (they love it):
"algo que me super encanto fue de hoy dia las bandas mexicanas ya no tienen ni deben ser 'abanderadas' porque seria una hipocresia...ya se acabo las epocas del socio-politico, el mestizaje, el uso de instrumentos/elementos autoctonos en la musica y las referencias al Comandante Marcos que no sirvieron de nada de algunas bandas que mejor no menciono. No digo que estas bandas esten cerrando los ojos ante la problematica que existe en Mexico pero que mas bien es una decision muy personal de hacer las cosas de otra manera."
For the Spanish-impaired: Mexican bands no longer have to carry a "flag," the era of socio-political music is over, no more mestizaje, autochtonous rhythms or instruments, or references to Subcomandante Marcos. OK, so she just dismissed everything that got me excited again about Latin American rock in the 90s. But it's an accurate description of what's out there now. Now, here's what I have beef with: the idea that these choices of sound, genre and language are "una decisión muy personal de hacer las cosas." While musicians freely and individually choose which propuesta they're going to take up, these decisions are not made in a vacuum.
1) Language: The first Latin rock bands sang in English for a couple of reasons. They completely identified rock with the U.S./England and therefore, with their language. Rock = English. And it was a form of rebellion against a repressive idea of nationalism. Lo nacional = la dictadura. But there was a reaction against that because English, and rock, came to be identified with the cosmopolitan middle class, and various bands began singing in Spanish as a gesture against cultural imperialism (todo lo bueno viene de afuera, local products are inferior to what's imported). One of the reasons the pendulum is swinging back is that, within the U.S. market, that left bands like Café Tacuba out of radio play in English-language stations (which still play little non-English music) and out of Spanish-language radio stations (which still hate rock-n-roll). So the return to English is a marketing decision, pure and simple. An understandable one, but by no means a strictly "personal" one.
2) "Lo autóctono": Here, as much as my personal taste says otherwise, I have to agree that the moment to creolize rock-n-roll has passed. It no longer sounds new, or transgressive to add guitarrón or gaita to rock songs. Shakira adds surf guitars to her pop, Tito El Bambino adds bhangra to reggaetón, and Calle 13 blow everything out of the water. And besides, bands like Soda Stereo always sounded Latin American without a single reference to milonga or folk. On the other hand, compare a band like Los Tres to Los Bunkers, both from Chile. The former mixes rockabilly, psychedelic, Chilean folk, Beatles melodies into a new sound that to me, nonetheless sounds very South American. The latter has similar roots, at least when it comes to Kinks-ish British invasion. But they sound flatter, Tres lite. And I feel the same about a lot of bands that are trying to sound like Air, or !!! or Franz Ferdinand or Coldplay. Nice, but kinda flat.
3) The social concerns: Here is where I turn into an old Marxist. In the 1960s and 1970s, rock in and of itself was a badge of protest. But it left rockeros open to accusations of self-hating, of vendedismo, of belonging to the priviledged class. All the Latin American economic crises of the 1980s and 1990s, created by the IMF and World Bank, left the middle class screwed. Even the college-educated professionals felt more directly, in the flesh, their Third World status. Solidarity comes more easily in those circumstances. But I think that now the turn to the cosmopolitan is a symptom of fatigue. Protesting makes no difference, the world is going to hell, let's stop sacrificing and wear some glitter. Emphasizing surfaces and kitsch can be oppositional (see Spain's La Movida as an example in Almodovar's "El Laberinto de la Pasión"), but it requires a conscience, which from the conversations I've had with bands of late, is not there. Not that bands have to be "flag bearers" for any cause, but I also see this as a sign of the times. Capitalism has won, let's join the party.
I'll have to think a bit more about which new Latin American bands these days I do like. I've been more partial to bands -- the electronica ones, especially -- from Colombia, where doing anything is political. It all comes back to context.
