Los Bitchos, Brudenell and old-school cumbia: “The spontaneous nights are always the best!”
The modern music scene often gets a lot of flack for its business focus, with the rise of streaming services completely changing the ways in which the music industry operates. This has given rise to a wide variety of largely uninspiring, commercially viable pop music. However, a by-product of these new technologies is that most people have an imaginable wealth of music to explore at their fingertips. As a result, innovative and eclectic groups like Los Bitchos have risen to prominence.
From their inception in 2017, the London-based band have been reinvigorating dancefloors across the world with their unique blend of indie rock, Latin psychedelia and old-school cumbia. With this distinct instrumental sound, Los Bitchos have carved out a name for themselves within the London scene and beyond. Ahead of the release of their long-awaited sophomore album Talkie Talkie later this year, I had the pleasure of posing a few questions to the band to find out more about their live shows and famously wide range of influences.
My first experience seeing Los Bitchos happened on a stormy night in Leeds, during which they played a packed-out show at Brudenell Social Club. While the rainy skies of northern England did not form the most likely setting for the sun-soaked sounds of Latin psychedelia, the band managed to get a distinctly damp crowd on their feet with apparent ease.
Truthfully, it was one of the friendliest crowds I have ever been a part of, and according to the band, that feeling goes both ways. “It’s always been a lively vibe at our shows,” the group revealed to me, “but as our confidence has improved, the audience has definitely grown with us, and we bounce a lot of energy off each other”. It must have been difficult to initially get audiences on board with Los Bitchos’ unique instrumental sound, but it seems as though the timeless sounds of cumbia have a pretty universal appeal.
Cumbia originated in Colombia, and it is one of the more danceable examples of traditional folk music. During the Latin rock boom of the 1960s, many groups began to blend cumbia with influences of psychedelic and counterculture rock – it is these bands that Los Bitchos tend to draw upon with their euphoric style of cumbia rock. Aside from their incredibly fun live shows, it is the vast blend of influences that makes Los Bitchos such an appealing group.
The band’s influences are as far apart as the band members themselves. Australia, Sweden, Uruguay, and England are all represented within the quartet’s line-up, with each member coming from vastly different musical backgrounds. “We’ve incorporated influences from all of our backgrounds,” the band told me. “Our connections range from Serra growing up with Turkish music from her mother to discovering new music and genres. We are always learning about new music and taking inspiration as we go.”
Aside from the traditions of cumbia, Los Bitchos seem to be built upon an incredibly close friendship between the band members. “We love sharing music with each other and discovering new music together as well,” they said. “It’s a very collaborative band and everyone gets to be themselves – that’s really important for us.”
It is this sense of togetherness and collaboration that drives the euphoric live performances of the group, too. Speaking on their pre-show rituals, the group shared, “We pump each other up pre-show and put tunes on in the dressing room, or make each other a little cocktail,” explaining, “It’s amazing how you find the energy as soon as you go on stage. Our audiences are so fun and really bring the energy to the shows as well. Adrenaline always kicks in, and the music is so upbeat it makes it easy to have fun on stage”.
Every band has bad gigs, but with the endlessly optimistic sounds of Los Bitchos, it is difficult to imagine any audience standing still during their sets. “Some shows do unexpectedly really pop off, and we end up having a massive party night,” the band said. “The spontaneous nights are always the best! We had such a great night in Warsaw where the venue turned into a ‘90s club night, and we ended up staying for the night after too many shots at the bar while selling merch”.
Life in Los Bitchos seems to be an endless party with your closest friends, an atmosphere that every band should attempt to replicate within their own world. The band’s music is far more important than simple, non-consequential dance music, though. Through their tunes and their open discussion of influences, Los Bitchos have helped to introduce the timeless sounds of cumbia and Latin psychedelia to an entirely new generation, keeping that music alive for years to come.
Speaking on the enduring appeal of the age-old traditions of cumbia, Los Bitchos succinctly responded, “It makes you want to dance, which is timeless” – an argument which is certainly hard to argue with. For the uninitiated, breaking into the field of cumbia can be somewhat daunting, given the decades worth of material to sift through. Fear not, though, as the ever-generous Los Bitchos highlighted the Peruvian group Los Mirlos as an excellent starting place, as well as the 2007 compilation album The Roots of Chica, which they claim was “also a massive inspiration at the start of the band”.
Los Bitchos are particularly busy at the moment, with a hotly anticipated album on the horizon and a variety of colossal live performances to deal with, including a particularly exciting appearance at Bilbao BBK in Spain next month. For many groups, such a busy schedule might be somewhat overwhelming, but Los Bitchos have a tried and true method of getting through it: cocktails, cumbia and, above all else, dancing.
