los pirañas: historia natural

A celebrated instrumental supergroup featuring three of Bogotá's most visionary musicians: Eblis Alvarez (Meridian Brothers, Chúpame el dedo), Mario Galeano (Frente Cumbiero, Ondatropica), and Pedro Ojeda (Romperayo, Chúpame el dedo). Fusing the experimental possibilities of South American rhythms and sonics (cumbia, champeta, tropicalia, salsa, and more) with avant psych rock, dub minimalism, and spiked jazz, Los Pirañas are retro-futurism at its finest. The three members of Los Pirañas can all remember when they were in high school together in Bogotá, Colombia and just beginning to play music. Twenty-five years on and they've become internationally well-known musicians, spread across different bands, traversing multiple continents. Historia Natural, their third album, recaptures the spirit that moved them as teenagers. Although they'd played music together when young, Los Pirañas only came into being as a band in 2009. It gave them the chance to explore the complex vitality of Colombian rhythms mixed with Alvarez's unique blend of computer and guitar. Their debut release as Los Pirañas showcased the joys of "the trio format that was new to us," while the band's second release La Diversión Que Hacía Falta En Mi País came after a few years of touring. For their third outing they went searching for a nuanced naïveté and they found it, with Ojeda's adroit drumming and the muscular bass work of Mario Galeano of Frente Cumbiero fame, providing a solid anchor for the music. Together, the pair create a mighty tropical noise that frees up Alvarez for his guitar experiments. He's been working with computers and music for two decades, feeding his guitar through a laptop. Alvarez's guitar is a shapeshifter, constantly mutating sound and texture. It rarely sounds straight up, but there's never a doubt that someone is plucking the strings and bending the notes. Alvarez darts around and through the lines created by Ojeda and Galeano, leading or snapping at their heels. This is a band bristling with ideas, where the unspoken communication is so acute that all three of them can swerve together or turn on a dime. Their particular culture revolves very much around Colombia's capital, Bogotá, where they live and where they've always made music. A swirling, electric universe of music, created right in their own neighborhood. That's the real Historia Natural of Los Pirañas.