Meridian Brothers takeover: Andrés Gualdrón

The worldwide spread of music production technologies such as the Yamaha DX7 synthesizer or the Roland TR 808 drum machine in the 1980s changed popular music all over the world. The sounds of these instruments, manufactured by Japanese companies, are often reminiscent of the aesthetics of the decade and helped to make music production by electronic means more accessible.

Although collectively we may find it easier to associate the sound of these electronic instruments with the pop and Anglo-Saxon rock of the 1980s or with Afro-American genres such as Hip-hop and House, it is also true that these sonorities profoundly influenced the music composed in the Caribbean. In the case of the Colombian Caribbean region, since the early 90's independent studios emerged in cities like Cartagena and Barranquilla, where producers like Romi Molina, Álvaro Cárdenas or Mariano Pérez, together with musicians like William Simancas and entrepreneurs like Hernán Ahumada, launched multiple productions playing freely and creatively with these electronic technologies. The DX7 and the Roland drum machines not only cheapened and simplified the process of musical production but also allowed the configuration of a “modern” aesthetic for caribbean and afro-diasporic music. The songs included here from the groups Nuevo Tumbao, Grupo Renacer and Sensación 2000 are examples of this process.

The use of electronic instruments also brought with it unique and interesting consequences: the transfer of styles of African and Caribbean origin to the bright and artificial sonority of the Yamaha DX7 synthesizer or to the robotic rhythms and samples of the 808 was decisive for the emergence of genres such as champeta criolla, a popular style indelibly associated with an electronic sound quality ever since. Champeta music is exemplified here in songs like Picosa by the QAP Band, Rosa María by Caribe Stars or in the song El Egén Especial by the group Luz Verde, an electronic cover of the African classic Help Yourself Idleness by the Nigerians Super Negro Bantous. Also noteworthy are the allusions to contemporary trends such as house music (exemplified here by the music of Rafael Chávez and Elio Boom) or the inclusion of DX7 synthesizers in local accordion music and in music close to merengue and compás - as heard in the songs by Lisandro Meza y su Conjunto and the Los Inéditos orchestra included here.

Although the majority of the songs in the selection were recorded in Colombia, two songs show the scope of a similar process in other countries: far away from the Caribbean region, Lucerito by Ricardo Suntaxi is a synthesized version of the Ecuadorian Albazo music. Sukaina by Raoul Denis Jr., for its part, is an early example of the interactions between Caribbean music and electronic instruments in Haiti.