To celebrate their 25 years of career, the guys from Genitallica released “Death became fashionable”, a single that they knew was going to cause a stir and that was going to scandalize many.
“There are offended fans, but we have always seen music as a language,” said Andrés Sáenz, drummer of the group founded in the city of Monterrey, Mexico. “For us it is music, and in this case this was the fusion.”
Andrés refers to the integration they made of the rhythms of the corrido tumbado in their new single, which is part of the album that they will release in a few months and which is also called “Death became fashionable.” The dissatisfaction of many followers is due to the fact that they associate the corrido tumbado with songs that glorify the life of luxury and excess of drug traffickers in Mexico.
However, the guys from Genitallica found a gem in this sound that is so popular especially among the younger generations.
“At first we started to see what it was about; We began to investigate, to meet composer musicians,” said Andrés. “It looked complex, but we were surprised because we found quite quality content.”
The corridos tumbados, they discovered, are played with a series of unconventional instruments, such as the tololoche, which is performed in a “chicoteado” way; the chanchetas, which are a type of trumpet bent upwards, and the trombone, which in this case has buttons.
And the most surprising thing for them was to discover that the boys who play these instruments masterfully are young men between 19 and 21 years old; That is, they are less than half the age of the members of Genitallica, who are already close to 50 years old.
“Get together with some morrillos [niños] to play the instruments was incredible,” said Gerardo Olivares, second voice of the rock quartet. “We ended up getting caught up in the style of music.”
It is not the first time that Genitallica has done work like this, although perhaps none of their fusions have been so controversial. The rockers have recorded before with Banda El Recodo, Paquita la del Barrio, La Leyenda, Dr Shenka (from Panteón Rococó), Cristian Castro, Coda, Dharius and Caballo Dorado.
The new album, which will include 15 unreleased songs, will also have other rhythms, such as rock, cumbias, funk and ranchera.
“It comes with a lot of variety,” said Gerardo. “The backbone is the letters, to make the hamster run.”
This weekend they will perform at the Pal’ Norte festival in their hometown, and from there they will continue with a tour of several Mexican cities. Then, in the second part of the year, they will tour cities in Texas, Illinois and California.