Chicano Rock Music is rock music performed by Mexican American groups or music with themes derived from Chicano culture. Chicano Rock, to a great extent, does not refer to any single style or approach. Some of these groups did not sing in Spanish at all, or use many specifically Latin instruments or sounds, at least on what little we have heard. The main unifying factor, whether or not any explicitly Latin American music is heard, is a strong R&B influence, and a rather independent and rebellious approach to making music that comes from outside the music industry. Rock and roll (also spelled Rock n Roll, especially in its first decade), also called rock, is a form of popular music, usually featuring vocals (often with vocal harmony), electric guitars and a strong back beat; other instruments, such as the saxophone, are common in some styles. ... The ethnonym Mexican-American describes United States citizens of Mexican ancestry (14 million in 2003) and Mexican citizens who reside in the US (10 million in 2003). ... A Chicano or Chicana is a term used to indicate an identity held by some persons of Mexican descent living in the United States. ... Latin American music, sometimes simply called Latin music, includes the music of many countries and comes in many varieties, from the simple, rural conjunto music of northern Mexico to the sophisticated habanera of Cuba, from the symphonies of Heitor Villa-Lobos to the simple and moving Andean flute. ... Rhythm and blues (or R & B) is a musical marketing term introduced in the United States in the late 1940s by Billboard magazine. ...

Overview

There are two undercurrents in Chicano rock. One is a devotion to the original rhythm and blues and country roots of Rock and roll. Ritchie Valens, Sunny and the Sunglows, The Sir Douglas Quintet, Thee Midniters, Los Lobos, War, Tierra, and El Chicano all have made music that is heavily based on 1950's R&B, even when general trends moved away from the original sound of rock as time went by. Rhythm and blues (or R&B or even Runub) was coined as a musical marketing term introduced in the United States in the late 1940s by Jerry Wexler at Billboard magazine, used to designate upbeat popular music performed by African American artists that combined jazz and blues. ... country music, see Country music (disambiguation) In popular music, country music, also called country and western music or country-western, is an amalgam of popular musical forms developed in the Southern United States, with roots in traditional folk music, Celtic Music, Blues, Gospel music, and Old-time music that began... Richard Steven Valenzuela (May 13, 1941 – February 3, 1959), better known as Ritchie Valens, was a pioneer of rock and roll and, as a Mexican-American born in Los Angeles, California, became the first Mexican–American rock and roll star. ... Sir Douglas Quintet was a popular Rock and Roll group of the 1960s. ... Thee Midniters were amongst the first Latino rock bands to have a major hit in the United States, and one of the best known acts to come out of East Los Angeles in the 1960s, with a cover of Land of a Thousand Dances and the instrumental Whittier Boulevard in... Los Lobos Los Lobos is an American rock band, heavily influenced by rock and roll, Tex-Mex, country music, folk, R&B, blues, and traditional Spanish and Mexican music such as boleros and norteños. ... War was an American funk band of the 1970s that had its roots in California. ... ... El Chicano is a Latin R&B band from Los Angeles, whose influences can be found in rock, funk, soul, blues, jazz, and salsa. ...

Another characteristic is the openness to Latin American sounds and influences. Trini Lopez, Santana, Malo, and other Chicano 'Latin Rock' groups follow this approach with their fusions of R&B, Jazz, and Caribbean sounds; but all of the groups and performers have some of these influences. Los Lobos in particular alternates between R&B roots rock and the Latin rock style. Latin America consists of the countries of South America and some of North America (including Central America and some the islands of the Caribbean) whose inhabitants mostly speak Romance languages, although Native American languages are also spoken. ... Carlos Santana in concert, Barcelona 2003 Carlos Augusto Alves Santana (born 20 July 1947 in Autlán de Navarro, Jalisco, Mexico) is an American Grammy Award-winning musician and Latin-rock guitarist. ...

Even such songs like Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs "Wooly Bully" and ? & the Mysterians' "96 Tears", while not by definition "Latin Music", may have a Tejano influence in their whirling keyboard runs and beats. Sam The Sham and the Pharaohs were a rock and roll band from the mid-1960s led by Domingo Samuido (born 1934), a Mexican-American living in Texas and then New Orleans, known as Sam The Sham. They had several hits such as Wooly Bully, Little Red Riding Hood, and... ? & the Mysterians were an American garage rock band from the mid 1960s, originating in Saginaw, MI. The group is best known for 96 Tears a classic garageband record from late 1966 which also made #1 on the pop chart. ...

Ozomatli had led the new wave of Latin Rock groups that fuse multiple jusical genres. Ozomatli is a Latin funk/worldbeat/rock en Español group, formed in 1996 in Los Angeles, known as much for their extremely vocal activist viewpoints as their wide array of musical styles. ...

History

In places such as Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay area, and Dallas and Houston, Texas, the African-American audience was very important to aspiring Latino musicians, and this kept their music wedded to authentic R&B. Undoubtedly, many listeners in the 1960s heard Sunny and the Sunglows "Talk to Me", or Thee Midniters'and more famously, Cannibal and the Headhunters' "Land of a Thousand Dances" and assumed that the groups were black. The roots of Chicano rock are found in the music of Don Tosti and Lalo Guerrero ("The Father of Chicano Music") Tosti's "Pachuco Boogie," recorded in 1949 was the first Chicano million-selling record, a swing tune featuring a Spanish rap, using hipster slang called "Calo." Guerrero also adapted swing and "jump" styles to Spanish language recordings -- all this as rhythm and blues was beginning to emerge as a forerunner to rock 'n' roll. In the 60s there was an explosion of Chicano rock bands in East Los Angeles. One of the first to have a local hit, and even appear on Dick Clark, was The Premiers, with a cover of a Don and Dewey song called "Farmer John." It featured the beat from the popular hit, "Louie, Louie," which was in turn based on a Latino song, "Loco Cha Cha." An African American (also Afro-American, Black American, or black) is a member of an ethnic group in the United States whose ancestors, usually in predominant part, were indigenous to Africa. ... Caló is an Argot of Mexican Spanish spoken in the first half of the 20th century in the southwest United States and was associated with the Zoot Suit or Pachuco culture. ...

In the early to mid 1960s, the American audience was probably more open to Latin sounds than even today; because of the popularity of bossa nova, bugalú, mambo, and other forms. Also musicians who didn't conform to the rather limited range of early rock could find success as folk performers. Bossa nova is a style of Brazilian music created by Joao Gilberto and first introduced in Brazil by Gilbertos recording of Chega de Saudade, in 1958, a song written by Antonio Carlos Jobim, first released as a single, and shortly thereafter as the album by Gilberto, bearing the same... See Mambo (CMS) for the Content Management System Mambo is a Cuban musical form and dance style. ...

Trini Lopez, whose music was a mixture of folk, lounge pop, and R&B, was able to prosper before the Beatles came to America and Bob Dylan went electric. "Corazón de Melón" takes a Mexican folk tune, and like "Heart of my Heart", makes it into a relaxed, shuffling lounge tune. Trini mainly worked and recorded in a live setting (with a lot of audience participation), and soon the Beatles and The Beach Boys made studio recording effects dominant in rock, unfortunately making Trini's loose, breezy live-in-club style seem old fashioned all too soon. Folk Music, in the original sense of the term, is music by and of the common people. ... The Beatles were a pop and rock music group from Liverpool, England, who continue to be held in the very highest regard for their artistic achievements, their huge commercial success, and their groundbreaking role in the history of popular music. ... Bob Dylan (born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter, musician and poet whose enduring contributions to American song are often compared, in fame and influence, to those of Stephen Foster, Irving Berlin, Woody Guthrie, and Hank Williams. ... Brian Wilson, Al Jardine, Carl Wilson, Dennis Wilson and Mike Love The Beach Boys are a pop music group formed in Hawthorne, California in 1961 who are widely considered one of the most influential bands in rock and pop music history. ...

The British Invasion challenged all American musicians, not just Chicanos. The Sir Douglas Quintet is said to have made the most 'English' sounding American music of the Beatlemania period (actually since the English were playing music that was more rooted in R&B than many white Americans of that time, the Quintet were actually sounding 'English' by keeping to an all-American R&B/Country sound). Indeed, producer Huey P. Meaux put the Sir in the group's name to emphasize the connection, but that was more a marketing change than a musical one.

While none of these groups challenged the Beatles and the Rolling Stones for more than a brief time, Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs, ? and the Mysterians, and Thee Midnighters made music that was more like that of the British groups than many other American bands, like The Lovin' Spoonful or The Beach Boys. Part of this was their love of pure R&B, and perhaps, in spite of being just as American as anyone else, these bands were treated as "outsiders" to some degree and their music reflects this unconventional point of view. Also, many of these groups produced music on a very low budget, often working on small labels, or even self-producing music; giving some of their work a rougher feel. The Rolling Stones are a British rock group that rose to prominence during the British Invasion in the 1960s. ... Lovin Spoonful album cover The Lovin Spoonful was an American pop-rock band of the 1960s, named to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. ... Brian Wilson, Al Jardine, Carl Wilson, Dennis Wilson and Mike Love The Beach Boys are a pop music group formed in Hawthorne, California in 1961 who are widely considered one of the most influential bands in rock and pop music history. ...

Chicano punk

Chicano punk is a branch of Chicano rock with bands like Los Illegals, The Brat, The Plugz and Los Cruzados coming out of the punk scene in Los Angeles. Cranking out politically-charged “Pachuco-Punk”, sung in Spanglish wedded with the then unheard of combination of 3rd world rhythms and industrialized flamenco since 1979, East L A’s Los Illegals played an essential part in shaping the music scenes that exist in the barrios of the world today. ... The Plugz is a punk rock band from Los Angeles, California that formed in 1978. ... Formed in 1984, Los Cruzados were a rock band from Los Angeles, California. ... This article is about the largest city in California. ...

References

Loza, Steven Joseph. Barrio Rhythm: Mexican American music in Los Angeles. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, c1993. ISBN 0252062884

Monsalvo C. Sergio. La canción del inmigrante: de Aztlán a Los Lobos. México, D.F.: Tinta Negra, 1989. ISBN 968633601X

Reyes, David, and Waldman, Tom. Land of a Thousand Dances: Chicano rock 'n' roll from Southern California. Albuquerque [N.M.]: University of New Mexico Press, c1998. ISBN 0826319297

• Guerrero, Mark, articles on Chicano Rock
• Wildman Producer of Chicano Rock documentary

See also

• Tex-Mex and Tejano
• Latin American music
• Little Ray