Dallas Cumbiaholics

My first stop on Saturday night was 7-Eleven on St. Francis.  I made my purchase as a large adult black man talked on his cell phone next to the checkout. He talked on the line about his mother-in-law, well his baby-mama's mama, and he seemed to be looking for someone to come pick him up.  As I left the store, to my back he blurted "My man, my man, nice shoes.  You put that all together real nice.  Everybody know you went to Burlington."

I didn't turn around, as I was almost out the door and I wasn't really sure if he was talking to me, or what he was trying to achieve. Maybe I should have turned around and smiled, and let him know that the joke was on him - everything I was wearing I'd bought at a thrift shop.

I continued my path, crossing the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge to the Trinity Groves area, which is sort of like Main Entrance at San Agustin in San Pedro, but a bit more hipster.  I had dinner with friends at Souk, a supposedly Moroccan Restaurant that served generic Mediterranean food and served me a second round of eleven-dollar scotch I didn't ask for.

Being in that shared patio setup just like Main Entrance, the music from neighboring restaurants bled over the Arab Pop at Souk, and I heard Molotov's Gimme The Power coming, I think, from Chino Chinatown, an Asian-Latin fusion restaurant. That was a cool moment, and I'll surely hit Chino Chinatown up one day soon.

My dinner friends were looking to keep the party going but they weren't adventurous enough to follow me here:

I headed to Lower Greenville to fufil a hipster rite - for the first time ever I saw perform live an artist that I had discovered on Soundcloud, un tal Erick Jaimez.



Erick opened the show, and though I am also now a fan of Faded Deejayz, the Cumbia Trap Lord stole the show.

Upon entering The Crown and Harp I noticed more non-white faces than you usually find at a Lower Greenville establishment, especially one that claims to be an Irish Pub.  There were though a few yuppies and hipsters that shared my complexion and I was excited to see this grand mestizaje, the South-of-the-Border sabor mixed with crunk beats and flow moving the culos of people on the north side of town.  However, once the initial more generic mainstream hip-hop mixing gave way to Erick Jaimez's less orthodox grooves, lots of white ears left to go hear Miley Cyrus on the jukebox across the street.

Erick isn't the first to mix cumbia and hip-hop, but he does so more artfully than most.  When a guacharaca beat just needs to be guacharaca, he gives it some space before dropping the bass, and when a chicha classic needs some ponchis-ponchis to get the crowd going he pushes it. While a lot of DJs will drop a rap a cappella over a sonidero beat, Erick explores Latin Music more widely, sampling not only from Colombian/Mexican cumbias, but also Argentine villera and Peruvian chicha as well throwing in some Latin Pop, Rock en Español and Chente, and on the hip-hop side rather than just throwing in Dirty South and Top 40 staples, Erick has forged a musical identity inside the hip-hop DJ subgenre of Trap, spicing it up with some Old School, a bit of New Orleans Bounce, and, for lack of a better word, EDM (I think that word used to be 'House').

All this is done rather seamlessly. The distinct genres don't sound forced together.  It sounds surprisingly natural to hear Fito Olivares all trapped out while Pharell raps over it.  Speaking to Erick Jaimez after his set, he expressed his intention to 'bring cumbia back' to Dallas, and his sound does a lot to define our city musically, mixing together sounds that Dallasites, at least those of us from certain neighborhoods, have been hearing side-by-side all of our lives.  This is music that really reflects the Mexican-American musical identity, if I may dare make such a claim.

When I hit the club to shake my nalgas while sipping a Dos XX, I wanna be listening to cumbia trap music.

Sagrado Sábado

Saturday, free from work, a awake at the hour my body decides. I shower in the radiant sunshine that escapes from behind the curtains, rather than in the dark madrugada.

I greet the bartender that I live with and the taquero that he works with, who are still drinking away last night as I head out to great the day.

Desayuno un Marlboro rojo y una mandarina. In my car I turn on the radio, Jackson Brown´s Pretender - "When the morning light comes streaming in, I get up and do it again." And then Vampire Weekend´s Horchata as I pass by the streets of  Desdemona, Hermosa and Esta Buena.

Mesquite becomes Dallas, Casa View becomes Lochwood. HUD Homes give way to dream homes. But it´s all so subtle.  Neighborhoods and cities have that, a way of ending and beginning unpretentiously, no walls, no fences, no checkpoints, sometimes a sign or two.

I have order a medium Americano and a bagel at White Rock Coffee.  And I see this on the wall:

The art work of a second grader, hanging on the wall.

En el 2012, experimento de oro fallido

Hoy buscaba el disco solista de Nina Diaz, la de Girl in a Coma, y en Spotify me topé con Niña Dioz, una rapera güera, regia que por ahí el 2012 yo habia escuchado en alt.latino. Qué triste me hace sentir pensar en el 2012, o 2011, o 2007 - todos los años que viví en Monterrey. Tal vez no sea tristeza, ni saudade, solo una nostalgia intensísima, una sensación de juventud sepultada, una emoción como cuando buscas a un amigo en Facebook solo para darte cuenta que ya se dio de baja y no tienes ni su cel ni su correo.

Con la música hasta más patético me puse, buscando la letra de En el 2000 de la Natalia. Para el 2000 año en que cumplí 18 y empecé mi carrera, ya pensaba mucho en México. Yo no escuchaba Linkin Park, escuchaba El Gran Silencio. Sin querer huirme de las calles suburbanas de Dallas, ya me imaginaba en las de Coyoacán. No sé por qué pero ese mundo tan diferente y a la vez lo mismo de siempre me pareció muy atractivo.

Y así, logré en el 2007 inmigrar a México, a Monterrey. Me condené a la pobreza, pero me gané mucho, un nuevo yo. Mi época de oro siempre será esa, y para el 2012 había alcanzado su cumbre - terminé mi maestría, tuve una novia culta y trabajadora, conseguí un buen trabajo. Medio me movía con la gente más chida. Toqué en bandas. Iba a fiestas exclusivas. Cenabas en los mejores restaurantes.

Pero teniendo tanto, vi poco a poco que tenía muy poco. Y para el 2014 me fui de México. No fue que no quería al país. No era demasiada corrupción, ni tan pocas oportunidades. No era demasiada violencia, ni tan poca cultura - ya para el 2014 yo curaba todo eso viendo El Pulso de La República. Era la suma de los excesos y las deficiencias, multiplicada por los miedos del futuro y la tasa del cambio del dólar lo que me hizo marcharme para atrás a mi rancho.

 Entonces ya ando en Dallas, extrañando los tacos de trompo.

 Mi época de oro también se siente como un experimento fallido. O solo tengo una rara depresión, deja voy con el curandero de Harry Hines.

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Intro

The last 10 years I lost in customs lines and immigration offices. My 21st Century has been built over borders and in foreign lands. I left my homeland, with no intention to ever return, but now I am back, no longer a native. Ni de aqui ni de alla. How can two places be so different, yet life really still be the same thing? How can a be a part of one or the other, if I leave and everything continues as is?