Latin critical mass

>> Latinopalooza II delivers underground rock en espanol

by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

There's a funny bit in the press release for Latinopalooza II, the six-band showcase of local underground Latino rock happening this Saturday. "Imagine a group of Canadians," it reads, "moving to Italy, and the only access to Canadian music they have is '80s songs from Corey Hart, Parachute Club, Loverboy, Glass Tiger and--oh, no--Platinum Blonde!"

A terrifying concept, but it gives you a bit of an idea what the members of Mi Santa Sangre, El Antro and the others are looking at here in Montreal. Latino rock nights at various clubs around town all too often get mired in the late-'80s pop-rock boom that swept Latin America. True, it doesn't sink to the depths of Ricky Martin, but for the band members, raised on punk, metal and hardcore, it's something to complain about.

Complaining's a lot more fun with a stack of amps behind you, which is why the first Latinopalooza show, last March at Café Chaos, came to be. "There were four bands on the bill," recalls El Antro bassist Héctor Cáceres. "It was kinda cool, actually, it was packed. That's why we're doing it at l'X this time, because there were people standing outside who couldn't get in."

No bailo salsa

One point that Cáceres and Mi Santa Sangre members Cliff Caporale and Mariano Franco drive home over and over during our talk is that this burgeoning scene is by no means a Latino-only affair.

"A lot of the Latino bands we meet," says Caporale, "they don't play unless it's a Latino crowd. That's a bad mindset to have because there's not enough of a Latino crowd here to support this music."

"Music is for everybody," Cáceres says simply, "so play for everybody. That's it." At the same time, he admits to a certain agenda. "My point is to try and break with the association they give you--say you meet someone in the street, they ask you where you come from, you say Latin America. 'Ah, you dance salsa? Merengue?' That sucks, man."

"I don't have anything against salsa, musically," says Franco. "Our main goal with the band was not to get the Latino movement going. We just wanted to be a hard rock band."

Brown-power fist-shaking isn't really these guys' bag and strident nationalism pleases them even less. Frankly, they've got their hands full railing against the Catholic church--detouring occasionally to take shots at political corruption, though they don't wear their socioeconomic principles on their sleeves either. "The human being will never be happy," Cáceres chimes in. "Change, in either direction, will always leave some people happy and some complaining. It's as simple as that."

Iiiiiinstitutionalized!

They do fret a bit about the frequent use of English by non-Anglo bands internationally. Caporale, still jet-lagged from a holiday in Europe, says that he was saddened by the difficulty he had in unearthing homegrown hardcore in Holland, Switzerland and elsewhere that was sung in the native tongue. "I'd ask why and they'd say, 'Oh, there's those folk music people who sing in our language but we find it ugly.'" He notes the all-too-frequent lack of support local acts get in Latin America and, by the same token, the amount of Montrealers unaware of our own successful acts like Ramasutra or Kid Koala. Always good for a thoughtful interjection, Cáceres adds, "There's an old saying in my country--'Nobody is a prophet in their own land.'"

Franco, seeing a shining opportunity to be contrary, points out that the use of English does broaden one's range of communication. In fact, Mi Santa Sangre reflect the Montreal vibe by throwing English and French lyrics in when it suits them.

Franco also believes in a recent resurgence of Latino rock down south and its increasing visibility elsewhere. "There's some bands coming out of, say, Mexico or Chile, that have a big market in their own country and in the U.S. and Europe. Molotov, for example. Now the scene is really big and the companies are really interested in new local music. You can see really fancy rock magazines where there used to be just black and white fanzines. It's an institution."

There just might be an institution in the works here as well. "The important thing about the show," says Franco, "is that we're just a little part of the scene in Montreal. We're just starting, practically. It's about showing that there's something going on, even though we're really different from each other, a big variety of styles. You could be good or bad, professional or not, as long as the passion's there."

Latinopalooza II, with Mi Santa Sangre, El Antro, Los Pinguinos, Calambre al Cerebro, La Bohemia and Ultima Cura, at Salle de l'X on Saturday, Nov. 4, 8pm, $4, all ages