Latin Mafia

One Liner: Spanish indie pop, which, I guess I knew had to exist, but somehow didn't expect

Wikipedia Genre: reggaeton, Latin trap, house, Latin R&B, dream pop, indie pop
Home: Mexico City

Poster Position: Second Quarter - Line 8
Day: Saturday
Both Weekends.

Miller Lite Stage at 5:15.

Thoughts:  This was one of the bands that was teased with the postcards that went out before the lineup was announced.  I had no idea who they were, and now I know why.  This first song sort of feels like if a K-Pop song was in Spanish.  Which is an ignorant take, since I don't think I know a single K-Pop song, so maybe this is like what I imagine K-Pop would sound like in Spanish.  It is terrible.  Like, crazy generic guitar licks coming in over completely forgettable pop synth garbage.  And a bunch of Spanish words saying lots of things.

This band has two twin brothers doing the vocals, which is kind of fun.  Milton and Emilio de la Rosa, with their older brother Mike doing the production.  It's all in the family!  Wikipedia says they "appeared on the scene" using TikTok during the pandemic.  Not sure which scene, but they did some tracks on video in their bedroom and received a positive response.  By the end of 2022, they sold out the Olympic Velodrome in Mexico City in minutes.  By April 2024, they were at Coachella, and I guess now we get to enjoy this too.  They won the Lo Nuestro Award for Best Latin Fusion Song in 2024.  So, they've got that going for them.  Which is nice.

One album, 2024's TODOS LOS DIAS TODO EL DIA.  Which is weird to type and means Every Day, All Day.  JEAAAAHHHH!!!  But their top song is a 2023 single called "Patadas de Ahogado," which I swear I have ordered in a restaurant before.  What does that mean?  According to the google, it means "Drowning Kicks."  Which is a really weird title.  But I can't understand what they are singing about anyway, so maybe it is all about how a person they were drowning while doing hardcore mafia shit kept kicking them as they drowned?  Dunno.  221.4 million streams.

🎶 "I drowned that dude in the bathtub while he kicked like Pele!"  🎶 Iconic line for sure. Yeah, not really.  That song is not my thing at all.  Even if I could understand it, it sounds super lame.  Second-biggest streamer is "Julieta," which translates to "Julieta."  179.8 million streams.

Bro.  If you can sell out a stadium, you can afford some real Chuck Taylors.  Damn.  Also, that song is very boring as well.  Even if this was in English, I really think I would have felt the same way that these are bad tracks made by Mike in his bedroom when he should have just like, gone to college and become a nurse practitioner or something.  This is not my thing.

Feid

One Liner: Reggaeton/Urbano in Spanish
Wikipedia Genre: Urbano 
Home: Medellin, Columbia

Poster Position: Top Line - Line 2
Day: Sunday
Both Weekends.

T-Mobile Stage at 6:15.

Thoughts:  Always a fascinating thing to realize how limited your musical scope is.  I think I listen to an absolute ton of music, and yet I've never even heard the name of this guy who has FIVE billion stream songs in his top ten on Spotify.  But have I ever heard anyone say the word "Feid" before?  No, dear reader, I have not.  In fact, I need to figure out how you pronounce it.  Actually fascinating.  Not like feed, and not like the end of Bonafide.  You pronounce it like the word "faith," but with a Spanish emphasis.  Sort of like "fade," but with a little faiid to it.  There you go.  Faiide.

Salomon Villada Hoyos is from Medellin, Columbia, and also performs under the name Ferxxo.  To my extremely untrained ear, this just sounds like Bad Bunny.  Wikipedia calls this style of music "urbano," but also mentions that he got into reggaeton after he stopped playing the clarinet.  His background on Wikipedia is pretty limited - his dad is a university professor in "arts" and his mom is a preschool teacher and psychologist.  He got to work with other reggaeton artists like J Balvin, which helped him get bigger.  He is also apparently a partner to Karol G, who was here previously.

I winded about this last year when Carin Leon took this exact same spot on the poster.  Annoying to have an artist I can't understand at all take over a top tier spot in the lineup.  Yes, I know he is insanely popular.  But also, for me personally, this is just something I won't go watch.

His first singles popped out in 2014, but he didn't start getting serious streams until 2016 singles, about the time he partnered with J Balvin.  9 albums - 2017's Asi Como Suena, 2019's 19, 2020's FERXXO (VOL 1:M.O.R.), 2020's BAHIA DUCATI, 2021's INTER SHIBUYA - LA MAFIA, 2022's FELIZ CUMPLEANOS FERXXO TE PIRATEAMOS EL ALBUM (wtf is up with these album titles?), 2023's MOR, No Le Temas a La Obscuridad, 2023's FERXXOCALIPSIS, 2024's LOS 9 DE FERXXO Y SKY ROMPIENDO.  Typing all of that out truly sucked ass.  He has a million singles as well.

Top track is from FERXXOCALIPSIS, called "LUNA" and with 1.25 billion streams.  Also features something called ATL Jacob.

Sure.  No clue what he is saying, and the beat really gets me nothing.  I know that a lot of people disagree with me on that, which is fine, but I just don't get the appeal.  We'll do one more just to give you the flavor.  Second biggest is "Feliz Cumpleanos Ferxxo" with 1.20 billion streams.

I never want to come off as dismissing of these sorts of artists, and I'm sure someone from Columbia thinks that every Pearl Jam song sounds just the same, but ...  I think that maybe because I don't know the words, those just sound like another noise in the song, so that it just feels like the same beat with the same vocal noise over and over again.  I'll find something else to check out during this hour and leave it to the fun people to go dance their asses off.

Lunay

One Liner: Reggaeton guy
Wikipedia Genre: reggaeton and urbano
Home: Puerto Rico

Poster Position: Late Addition
Both Weekends.
Weekend One Saturday at 4:20 on the Tito's Stage.
Weekend Two Sunday at 4:30 on the Tito's Stage.

Thoughts:  Spanish language singer guy.  Real name is Jefnier Osorio Moreno.  That first name is cool.  Maybe it sounds like Hefner, which means this guy is a playboy pimp.  This music is apparently reggaeton.  I wouldn't know reggaeton if it bit me.  The bigger issue is that I understand nothing of what is being said.

Wikipedia says that he originally released music as Jefnier, before changing it up with Lunay.  And while this seems a simple thing, the fact that it is one of the limited facts on his Wikipedia page must mean it is a bigger deal than I am thinking: "On his musical style, Lunay has commented that his songs do not encourage violence or denigrate women. In an interview he gave to the top 40, he said: "Not necessarily, even if I am in this world of urban music, [do] I have to be fostering violence, which is against God's purpose. I just do what I like and I know the relationship I have with Him.""  Good job Heff!  

Meanwhile, one of his tracks has freaking 659 million streams.  So other people who dig this style of music apparently really dig his stuff.  "Soltera - Remix."

Ah yes, well when you add Daddy Yankee and Bad Bunny to the track, and I've actually heard of those dudes, I guess you end up with big streaming numbers.  I guess that song sounds fine?  I dunno.  Here's his second-most streamed, without those other famous dudes.  But with two other collaborators again - Anuel AA and Ozuna.  This is "Aventura" with 233 million streams.

I may not understand what the man is singing about, but I can definitely tell you that he's a handsome mofo.

Hopefully he has a wonderful crowd of folks.  I won't be among it.