Hay Que Venir al Sur | Yeehaw Sounds, en español!
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“Hay Que Venir al Sur” is a column from music journalist and Songmess podcast host Richard Villegas. Winking to the campy classic from Italian disco diva Raffaella Carrà, the column, like the song, is an invitation to explore the kaleidoscopic music scenes blossoming south of the border. We’re talking Colombian cumbia, Brazilian funk, and weird new trends across the Latin American internet. For the first installment, a look at the zeitgeist-defining rise of música mexicana.
It’s a little funny to kick off a South-branded column by focusing on one of the most relevant musical movements flourishing in North America, and yet here we are. But the truth is you’ve likely noticed a lot more twangy Spanish hooks blasting from the car radio, as well as accented names ending in the letter z splashed across magazines and major festival lineups. That’s because música mexicana (also known to many as Mexican regional music) is experiencing a metamorphosis within the pop culture landscape. No longer synonymous with dusty Southwestern cantinas and frou-frou quinceañeras—which are way more fun than they’re given credit for—Mexican-rooted folk genres such as corridos, norteño, mariachi, and banda sinaloense are intersecting with a new generation of artists switching up melodic and aesthetic codes for contemporary audiences.
Let’s set the scene: Last March, after a run of syrupy TikTok hits, Tijuana ensemble Eslabón Armado unveiled “Ella Baila Sola,” a trombone-fueled tale of boozy seduction cut in collaboration with newcomer Peso Pluma. Shockingly—at least to folks not noticing the Saloon-font writing on the wall—the song raced up the charts, becoming the first corrido to enter Billboard’s Top 10. They would later bring these sounds of the Mexican countryside into homes across Middle America with landmark performances on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. A month later, Texas rookies Grupo Frontera leapt from viral cover boys to unfathomable ubiquity when rapper and reggaeton star Bad Bunny, whom you might recognize as this decade’s most famous human alive, secretly orchestrated a collaboration for the low-phone-battery tearjerker “un x100to.” Days later, the Puerto Rican icon invited Grupo Frontera onstage during his headlining set at Coachella, flooding the California desert with cumbia norteña and heralding a new age of Mexican cowboy anthems.
So how did all this happen? Well, saddle up.
First, I think it’s important to underscore a fact most Americans struggle to see, in no small part due to the permanent sepia filter cast upon their southern neighbors by films like Sicario and whatever morbid Pablo Escobar biopic just dropped on Netflix. The point is, Latin America is thee place to be, and throughout the 2010s the global rhythmic dominance of reggaeton helped mainstream Spanish-speaking artists as Midas-touched hitmakers. This resulted in numerous blockbuster collaborations with Anglo titans like Beyoncé (“Mi Gente” w/J. Balvin) and Drake (“Mía” w/Bad Bunny), and even the occasional head-scratching K-pop hybrid. Not to mention the real pandemic: Daddy Yankee, Luis Fonsi, and Justin Beiber’s inescapable “Despacito.” But even before that, the exoticizing myth of the “Latin Boom” propagated through (not by) Y2K pop stars Shakira and Ricky Martin foretold a day when the charts would be ruled by r-rolling tanned heartthrobs armed with Spanish guitars. It turns out the showbiz soothsayers weren’t far off.
The most significant shift in this musical paradigm, however, is the advent of the internet and the democratization of fame. Like Eslabón Armado and Grupo Frontera, fellow genre leaders Fuerza Regida, Yahritza y Su Esencia, and Junior H amassed huge online followings before ever making a blip on radio. Then there was the cultural reset triggered by Sonora-born, Los Angeles–raised iconoclast Natanael Cano—a.k.a. the father of corridos tumbados, or trap corridos—who infused the downtrodden sierreño style of singer Ariel Camacho with the slurred bravado of his favorite SoundCloud rappers.
Cano’s 2019 breakthrough album Todo Es Diferente tapped into a vast, hardcore canon of outlaw tales—a historically complex minefield that claimed the lives of legends Valentín Elizalde, Chalino Sánchez, and Jenni Rivera. But Cano didn’t sing of smuggling bags of weed across the border; rather, he flexed about smoking his local dispensary’s finest strains. He wore bespoke fitted caps, limited-edition sneaker launches, and diamond-encrusted necklaces, straying from the fashion hallmarks of his border kin. And most of all, he recontextualized the bass guitar melodies of corridos from rustic tunes nestled deep in the record collections of Latino parents into the hazy Instagram soundtracks of their Gen Z offspring.
All of these stories are intertwined. Evolving demographics, a hunger for representation, and greater access to promotional and distribution tools have terraformed the music industry in the new millennium. Even profitable inter-genre strategies charted by reggaeton transpired into música mexicana. In 2019 Bad Bunny spearheaded the charge with his remix of Natanael Cano’s “Soy El Diablo,” followed by Snoop Dogg and Banda MS’s long-rumored team-up on “Qué Maldición,” while Colombian reggaeton diva Karol G delivered a norteño-fied ode to label hoarding with “Gucci Los Paños.”
Perhaps música mexicana’s most adventurous genre hopper is Peso Pluma, who after the runaway success of “Ella Baila Sola” was sculpted by industry brass into a mullet-wearing, goat-bleating jack-of-all-songs. Last year, his internet-breaking session with Argentine hype wizard Bizarrap strove for “Song of the Summer” status by melding saturated EDM synths with lively banda horns. In early January, he popped up on Colombian American R&B singer Kali Uchis’s latest album, Orquídeas, impressing critics and fans alike with his silky vocals on “Igual Que Un Ángel.” In sharp contrast, his tepid duet with Brazilian pop sensation Anitta on “BELLAKEO” was a jarring reminder that label-made collaborations are usually cynical reads of social media trends, as in this case you could find more chemistry in an episode of Breaking Bad. Also, with no personal connection to sounds and vernacular so distinctly Puerto Rican, the result was a cringe cosplay of Caribbean swagger.
Before we wrap up, I’d like to leave you with one more pro tip: Don’t swallow whatever the algorithm feeds you. It feels like everyone should know that, and yet the homogenization of a global pop sound is leading artists, audiences, and industry curators to prioritize “playlistability” over music that sparks curiosity and wonder. Of course it’s cool that Mexican folk artists are collabing with American rap gods, and to hear Korean pop idols harmonize over Puerto Rican reggaeton beats; but it’s also breeding a universal sameness of sound, like when too much genetic tampering leaves fruit utterly tasteless.
So here’s some homework. Inch toward the margins and you’ll find folky breakouts Ed Maverick, Bratty, and Kevin Kaarl, norteño kids that grew up listening to corridos and later melded those traditions with sad and fuzzy dream pop.
On the US side of the border, Los Aptos, DannyLux, Estevie, and Ariel & The Culture are injecting cumbia and corridos with intimate diasporic narratives.
And for dazzling, beat-driven experimentation, delve into the trap/pop/requinto bangers of La Plebada, ElArturo, and El Pilux.
These artists are taking the reins of their musical heritage, bucking imaginary land borders, and unspooling personal stories for clamoring bilingual audiences. They’re the present and the future of music, so don’t expect them to ride into the sunset any time soon.
Keep on listening!
Richard Villegas is a music journalist, podcaster, and professional chismoso with bylines in Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, Bandcamp, and Remezcla. When not raging behind his desk in the Dominican Republic, you can find him traipsing through Latin America in search of fresh underground music and a cheap local beer.
Illustration: Alvaro Tapia Hidalgo
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