Locos Por Juana: Grammy Nominated, L.A. Bound

Posted On: February 3, 2009

“Miami is Our Time Let’s Get it”

Score one for the home team as we got a call today from Locos por Juana, pictured here in their last Parrot peformance, to excitedly inform us they had been nominated for a grammy and will be flying out to L.A. manana for the awards ceremony on Sunday night. Good Luck, we’ll be watching.
Personifying the cliche of “an overnight sucess after ten years” Miami NewTimes had this to say about them: “The band’s frontman, Itagui Correa,a Colombian transplant and his eight-piece ensemble have spent a decade performing at alternative hot spots such as Jazid, Transit Lounge, Churchill’s, and PS14. They’ve just come back from several years of touring some 80 U.S. cities, representing their very Miami sound
The first five years of the decade-old Locos outfit were dedicated to forging a new mix of ska, reggae, cumbia, hip-hop, and other rhythmic genres brought together by the group’s diverse North and South American roots. The second five have been about getting people outside Miami to bend an ear, and the results have been phenomenal.
In 2003, BBC America named Locos por Juana its “Best New Latin Rock Band.” By 2004, the group’s self-titled debut, released two years prior, was hitting record stores and airwaves in London and Amsterdam. In 2005, Locos was nominated for a Latin Grammy in the category of Best Album by Group for its energetic Música P’al Pueblo.And most recently, they got to record some tracks for their forthcoming (and Grammy nominated) album, La Verdad, in Mexico City with renowned producer and DJ Toy Selecta, known for bringing hard-core Latin hip-hop acts such as Mexico’s Control Machete into the limelight. These experiences, combined with the hatching of four Locos babies now ranging in age from one to four, has helped the band evolve, says Venezuelan bassist and MC Guillermo “Chamo” Cabral. “Being on the road, sharing with people, becoming parents — these things have made us mature, and that influences the music that we perform and write,” he says. “It’s Locos por Juana in 2008. It’s reloaded.”
This reloaded version often features more pensive lyrics laid onto hyperactive-style tracks that made their previous albums so popular. For example, Correa wrote “No Te Preocupes” (“Don’t Worry”) with his one-year-old daughter Salome and the other Loquitos in mind. Using drums and accordion to tease out Correa’s folkloric cumbia upbringing, the whimsical number assures the musicians’ offspring that they’re loved and appreciated, however far the band strays from the nest for its musical aspirations.”
Here’s a detail from the Grammy website and more photos from their last Parrot Gig
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