Bomba Estereo
Album: Blow up
Release Date: July 7, 2009
Although Bomba Estereo formed in 2005 in Colombia, their buzz in the United States grew with their first performance at this year's SXSW (Huge music conference held in Augstin, TX annually featuring artists from all over the world).
The buzz generated from SXSW has landed several gigs for Bomba Estereo in New York City for this year's Latin Alternative Music Conference (LAMC) (
http://www.latinalternative.com/ for more information). The LAMC showcases latin alternative artists in a one-week conference featuring discussion panels for media and artists and many free shows throughout New York City.
"Blow up" is being released on Nacional Records label (who you may know for releasing Manu Chao, Aterciopelados, Fabulosos Cadillacs, Nortec Collective, etc). Bomba Estereo describes their music as "cumbia psicodelica" because of its explosive dance sound, combining electronica, dub and hip-hop with Colombian rhythms like cumbia and champeta.
‘Blow Up’s first single is the infectious track “Fuego.” Lead vocalist Liliana “Li” Saumet describes its inspiration: “We wanted to make a colorful song. It is all about the sun and getting sucked into the world. It’s about being in another state-of-mind.”
The first song on "Blow up" is "Cosita Rica" and it immediately stands out with its light drumming beat taken over by Li Saumet's ethereal dreamy voice and then breaks into hip-hop and dance beats that take the song to a completely different level than you expected.
"Juana" is a funny lively song about a woman letting loose during Barranquilla's carnaval.. or being loose at the carnaval...we'll leave it to you to decide.. (haha)
"Feelin'" is a modern song mixing english, spanish lyrics and cultures together so flawlessly that the song requires no translation regardless of what language you speak and what country you are from. Simply turn it on and dance.
There are several instrumental songs in the album "Camino Evitar" is heavy with flutes and beats you would imagine are what dreams are made of, and "Palenke" that keeps you in suspense until the last beat.
"Nina Rica" begins sounding like a traditional cumbia (made me think of Celso Piña) and ends up sounding like Kinky (the band not he adjective...). The song has a message critizing commercialism and our obsession with appearances, "yo soy una niña rica tengo 20 años y 30 cirujias".
Overall, Bomba Estereo hit a home-run with this album (they have previously released Vol.1¨, 2006, Polen Records and ¨Estalla¨, 2008, Polen Records, Nacional Records.). I'm already adding it to my work-out playlist and its definitely guaranteed to keep you moving.
Bomba Estéreo:
Li Saumet: voice.
Simón Mejía: loops, bass.
Diego Cadavid: percussion.
Kike Egurrola: drums.
Julián Salazar: guitar.
