The 16th edtiion of the Latin Alternative Music Conference, LAMC, took place last week in New York City, with industry-oriented panels at a Midtown hotel and concerts and showcases all over town. In this episode of the Manero Pop Podcast, José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez talk about their favorite artists in the conference's lineup, the state of Latin alternative music and their own narcissistic personality disorders.

The recent tour of Mexrrissey —a Mexican indie supergroup playing the songs of The Smiths and Morrissey in Spanish and with Latin arrangements— revived the flames of one of pop culture's most interesting phenomena: the devotion the Manchester singer generates among Latinos in the United States, Mexico and the rest of Latin America. 

On the surface, it is a paradox: a gloomy, tortured and over-sensitive singer-poet from England would have no possible appeal to hard-working and tough macho men from Mexico. But reality —as Latinos well know— is way more complex than any given set of stereotypes.

Take a trip to Mexchester with José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez.

Recent album releases by a number of female singers that can loosely be grouped under the pop umbrella —from Ximena Sariñana to Lila Downs, Natalia Lafourcade and Natalia Jiménez— are the excuse for José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez to talk about the status of female Latin pop.

Can these artists really be grouped together as pop artists? Are some of the singer-songwriters in this group taking themselves too seriously? And also: is a good pop song one that you end up liking even in spite of yourself?

Listen to episode 6 of the Manero Pop Podcast, read the articles that inspired it here and here, and send your feedback to [email protected].

 

It all started with a press release announcing that Maná's latest album, Cama Incendiada, had gotten a four-star review. (Well, our distaste for Maná started years ago, but that's a different story.) The fact that a respectable music site like AllMusic would give the most notorious cheese rockers south of the Border such a high rating made us remember other similar cases of great reviews of mediocre Latin pop music by otherwise respectable American music writers. Even when AllMusic expressly states that they "rate albums only within the scope of an artist's own work," the review made us wonder if there was something else at work here: an embarassing double-standard when it comes to reviewing Latin pop music. In other words, can someone seriously claim that Cama Incendiada is "brilliant"?

You've probably heard the news by now: the variety TV show Sábado Gigante will end his record-breaking 53-year run on the air come September.

The show started in Chile in 1962, but after moving to Miami in 1986, it became an institution of Latino television in the United States, and a cultural touchstone of the immigrant experience.

But Sábado Gigante was not free of controversy: even when the immediate reactions after the news of the show's cancelation broke were cries of "devastation," as they days went a very different reaction came to light. Several critics expressed their hatred of a show they considered "racist and misogynistic."

Here, José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez discuss the impact of the Sábado Gigante on Latino pop culture, and interview blogger Laura Martínez and former member of the show's Clan Infantil, Paz Zárate.

UPDATE: During his interview with Laura Martínez, José Manuel Simián made an implicit reference to Univisión's host Fernando Fiore, who is no longer with the network.

Papi chulo. Hey, papi, ven p’acá. That guy is such a papi. Ay, papi.

There’s so many uses for that word, but what does it mean? Is it a distinctive form of Latino manhood? Is it a stereotype emanated from our pop stars? Is it a good or a bad thing? What’s the difference between being a papi and a Latin lover? Or is it just a Latino twist on being a metrosexual? More importantly, if it is a cheesy attitude or style, can Latinos make fun of other Latinos?

Listen to José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez go down the hole of papihood hoping they make it out alive.

Former Playboy models making all the kids (and dads!) of Latin America sing and dance? An orphan kid living in a barrel while everyone acts like it’s no big deal? Talking turds? Suicidal tías? A puppet mouse speaking with sexual innuendos? A rip-off of Miss Piggy that made kids watch in a strange mix of morbidity and pleasure?

Yep, those are some of the things Latin American kids of the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s were exposed to through television programming apparently devised for them.

José Manuel Simián and Marcelo Báez talk about this and more on the second episode of the Manero Pop Podcast

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Is there a particular brand of Latino cool, different from the mainstream American one? Which icons define coolness in the Latino world? What is the opposite of Latino cool? And more importantly: what does all of this have to do with Willie Colón and Marc Anthony? These are some of the questions that José Manuel Simián (Executive Editor of Manero) and Marcelo Báez (DJ, musician and contributor to Manero) tackle in the first episode of the Manero Pop Podcast—a free-form biweekly conversation on Latino pop culture.

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