It's no surprise that Latin music has become more popular both nationally and locally, as the population shifts in California and elsewhere move towards a larger Latin population.
Ana Tijoux
Eric K. Arnold
Hip hop/Urban Latino performer Ana Tijoux, on stage at Oakland's New Parish in February.
More unexpected, though, is the emergence of the Bay Area as a hub of the Urban Latino sound, a fusion-oriented subgenre which is to hip-hop and reggae what Latin rock was to rock’n’roll in the ‘70s.
The name Urban Latino itself goes back to the eponymous NYC magazine which emerged in the mid-‘90s to cover the lifestyle and culture of a bilingual, bicultural 18-34 demographic of Latinos, Hispanics, and Chicanos living in urban cities. Along with census data confirming that states like California and Texas are indeed becoming more urban and more Latino, Urban Latino as a cultural movement has gained considerable momentum over the past decade. Flashpoints along the way have included the addition of a Latin Grammy awards show (which debuted in 2000), the more recent rise of commercial radio stations with reggaeton formats, and both the importing and exporting of Latin versions of hip-hop, house, and dancehall reggae.
There are few boundaries in Urban Latino, which draws on a diverse range of stylistic influences, from traditional Latin and Afro-Caribbean music to ocho (sacred Yourban music), to funk, electronica, rap, mariachi and surf rock.
Thanks in no small part to Los Rakas, the Oakland-based Panamanian duo who have ridden the reggaeton wave to national and international recognition, Urban Latino is especially prominent in the East Bay. Not since the short-lived hyphy movement has a genre made such a splash — and this one has much broader appeal.
FunkyC1
Eric K. Arnold
Funky-C at the New Parish
Evidence of this could be found on a recent Saturday night at the New Parish, which is fast becoming the East Bay’s premier live venue for buzzworthy bands. Despite the rain, a near-capacity crowd turned out in droves to see Los Rakas and Chilean hip-hop sensation Ana Tijoux. The evening was supposed to be an Urban Latino summit, bringing together rising stars from two continents to share one stage.
Yet when Los Rakas’ flight from New York was delayed due to bad weather, the night turned into a breakthrough performance by Tijoux.
The evening began with a performance by Funky-C, a live Latin hip-hop/funk band featuring members of Bayonics, who warmed up a cold, wet February evening with a groove-infused set which featured inspired covers of songs by Tupac Shakur and the Orishas, as well as several original numbers. The crowd wasted no time in taking to the dance floor, as well as filling the upstairs balcony—even spilling out into the patio area, where clouds of mota wafted into the air.
If the audience was disappointed at Los Rakas’ absence, they didn’t show it, possibly because of the developing buzz surrounding Tijoux, whose performance the previous night at San Francisco’s Elbo Room had drawn rave reviews. Several audience members mentioned they had come to the New Parish specifically after hearing from friends who had caught Tijoux’s Friday night show.
anatijoux2
Eric K. Arnold
A rising star, nominated for a Latin Grammy for last year’s debut album “1977”—a reference to the year of her birth—Tijoux represents an interesting cultural dichotomy. Born in Chile, raised in both her native land and France, and heavily influenced by the underground aesthetic of ‘90s American hip-hop, Tijoux goes against the grain of both current stateside rap and the dominant Urban Latino style, reggaeton.
Eschewing both the overly-commercialized, trend-following sound of today’s radio-friendly rappers, and the equally over-the-top bombast of their Latino reggaeton counterparts, Tijoux’s style favors a fluid lyrical flow over catchy, Auto-Tune-enhanced hooks. The beats on “1977” are somewhat sparse, employing sample loops—a ‘90s staple, which have all but disappeared in contemporary American rap. Despite its obvious retro leanings, what propelled “1977” into the forefront of the international hip-hop scene were Tijoux’s vocals, delivered in both Spanish and French, which spoke to both a Latin hip-hop variant of progressive feminism and an affinity for a traditional hip-hop sensibility – an old-school vibe coming from a fresh new face.
What became evident from Tijoux’s impressive Oakland performance was a third element, that of indigenous cultural influences, which has frequently informed hip-hop from Cuba, Brazil, and other places in the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora. This element isn’t quite so obvious on “1977”—which, Tijoux has explained, is a tribute to the era in which she, and Chile, embraced hip-hop—but it came across loud and clear during her New Parish set. Tijoux’s lyrics were certainly more meaningful for those in the audience for whom Spanish was their native tongue, but even non-Spanish speakers could find something entrancing in her melodic flow and the universal language of fist-pumping gestures.
Tijoux came on stage in a simple outfit: jeans and a t-shirt, which read “sudaca,” a once-perjorative term for Spanish-speaking Latinos which has been reclaimed as a word of empowerment. On her arm, however, she sported a multicolored wristlet made of woven beads—an obvious symbolic reference to native Chilean culture—which put her “look” in context. Unlike, say, Lady Sovereign, there was nothing gimmicky about her.
As Tijoux performed, there was a sense of witnessing something special. Even without a live backing band, assisted by just a DJ and a hype man, she came off as radiant, magnetic, and thoroughly entertaining—emphasizing emcee skills, the hip-hop art form, and an underlying sense of culture.
Her performance upended the conventional wisdom surrounding hip-hop, suggesting that international rap artists can be just as authentic as those born and bred in the United States—or even more so.
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