I miss the sound of acoustic guitar

And what the hell, another music video too.

Los Bunkers: Sueño Con Serpientes

FUERAAAAAA DE AQUI

Going home for spring break! Excited to chill with the fam for a bit. Had this song in my head lately. It's actually about abuse BUT it has a really catchy refrain: Fuera de aqui (Get out of here) which is why I am adopting it as the official start of spring break song.

One Problem Set Left til Spring Break Song

A Hopeful Song

Newly Annointed Late Night Library Theme Song...

"At home she's looking for interest
At home she's looking for interest
She said she was ambitious
So she accepts the process
She said she was ambitious
So she accepts the process"

........................................

"At home she feels like a tourist
She fills her head with culture
She gives herself an ulcer
Why make yourself so anxious
You give yourself an ulcer"

Gang of Four, "At Home He Feels Like a Tourist"

There is no better song I can think of to describe late night study here.

Hip- hop 2

It just blows my mind how much cool music is out there that i have absolutely no knowledge of. Here's an interesting cast of South American hip- hop characters I've been introduced to just in the last few days:

Anita Tijoux- 1977
A female Chilean rapper! Her french stage name comes from the fact that she was raised in France due to her parent's political exile.


ChocQuibTown- De Donde Vengo Yo
Afro-Colombian hip-hip


Bomba Estero- Fuego
Also Colombian


Juana Fé- La maquinita
Not actually hip- hop at all, it's alternative cumbia from Chile aka Chilombiana. But I finally figured out who this song was by!

Hip- hop

For some weird reason, listening to rap helps me focus when I'm doing work, maybe because it has a steady beat? At any rate, I am burning up in the Tisch library right now (which is probably only 75 degrees but feels positively balmy compared to the outdoors and my 58 degree house) rocking out to Chilean rap group Tiro de Gracias. I never really got around to writing about this while I was in Chile, but it is fascinating to me how "street culture" of the US has been exported and reworked, in both its positive and negative manifestations. Think graffiti covered walls, and "flaite" fashion, a degrading Chilean word that basically is the equivalent of looking "ghetto". Baggy shirts, flat brim caps and all. In the same way that rap is pretty much the only music that voices the problems of the inner city in the US, rap in Chile provides a similar voice to urban poverty, although there's also a stronger tradition of socially conscious folk music.

Anyway, Tiro de Gracias. They kind of sound like a really white (although not quite Beasty Boysesque) Chilean permutation of 90s rap.
Joven de la Pobla (roughly translating to Kid from the Hood. If you look in the background of this video, the landscape is pretty similar to what it looked like where I worked in Maipú. The tall buildings are the Chilean equivalent of housing projects)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_lxa7nam90

Melaza
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPwgkGch5cE&playnext=1&list=PL03DF7E075B4642E7

THIS IS SO COOL*

Ok, slightly less cool than say, Patagonia, but anyway I found this really cool site that has "pocket documentaries" of Chilean indie rock. Basically just short music videos in pretty places. But still, purty neat.
Yaktoka.org

November 24: Music in the City/Thanksgiving on a Wednesday?

Word of the day:
camote (Chile)- sweet potato
ponche- a drink with white wine & chirimoya (a fruit from the North of Chile)

Today featured two very interesting musical panoramas that I wanted to write about.
-During the hubbub of the national paro, featuring a strike by thousands of public servants (including teachers employed by municipalities) a lone violinist played a sad but sweet tune just outside the Baquedano metro station. It seemed fitting, people marching for more rights they will probably never recieve, but keeping the hope and action of seeking alive.

-On a bus I took up the Alameda to Las Condes, a Brazilian drummer got on. In broken Spanish he explained he was going to play some samba. It had been a hot day and although it was joyful music performance lacked luster. Without a band behind, the lone samba drum seemed plaintive and echoing through the bus, where few people watched or listened, everyone plugged into their individualized i-pods and individual dramas. It struck me as terribly sad, a voice far from home, searching for ears and finding none.

I had a very UChile experience today. I went to class expecting to have my final for “Globalization and Copper” but when I arrived the professor (after having sent out a message earlier in the afternoon telling us to come to class even though several of the facultades were on strike) informed us that there had been a problem and that our final examination would now be held next week. I am fairly certain that heads would roll if a professor at Tufts tried to pull that one. Just saying.
Luckily, however, this meant that I could go on time to the Thanksgiving dinner our program directors had planned for us, in the beautiful barrio alto home of our program assistant Loreto’s mother. Dinner was delicious, and possibly the most “American” thanksgiving I’ve ever had: they served sweet potatoes with marshmallows and the jelly kind of cranberry sauce, neither of which I had ever had before. It was also interesting to be eating meat again- last Thanksgiving I hadn’t, breaking the American model of animal protein as central to any meal. There were some very Chilean touches to the meal however- pebre, a delicious spicy sauce, Chilean bread, some exquisite wine (agua rojo as our program director jokingly called it). It was kind of bittersweet to have the whole entire group in one place as we realized it might be the last time that every single one of us would be together again. Ahh gringo pack! We’ve been blessed with some really great group chemistry that has made this semester especially wonderful.

MÚSICA

A few more listens...Guess who doesn't tener ganas to read about import substitution industrialization anymore...A bunch of these guys definitely should have made up here earlier, so we'll call it rectifying a grave error rather than procrastination.
Mostly a "muy tipico chileno" edition.

Los Tetas- Corazon de Sandía
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28WdtLHF2nM
So of like a funkier/rappier Chilean version of the Red Hot Chile Peppers. Also super 80s/90s. In about the same way as as nylon tracksuits.

Chancho en Piedra- Locura Espacial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4fzdpJ7yl4
Even more like a Chilean version of the Red Hot Chile Peppers.

Matorral- Hasta que cubra el mar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjk2zFo8xR4
Rock with a bit of a retro twist

Los Jaivas- Todos Juntos (Kind of like an unofficial national anthem)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me4gBn3sb48
Los Jaivas- La Poderosa Muerte-From a really cool project recorded at Machu Pichu.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExGOc5dVY10

EPIC fail on my part on not putting up anything by them earlier!!! Muy tipico chileno. Funny story with their name- Jaiva= a type of Chilean freshwater crab. But originally they were called hi-bass, as in the bass, jazz and all that. Since the name didn't translate well, they Chilenized it and made it punny. Hi-bass= jaivas...jajaja.

Los Tres-Amor Violento
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4g9jvY_gMGo

Sol y Lluvía-Pudahuel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9BPRwrN_7w

Nano Stern y Chinoy- Para la Pena No
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeaPmfX4rnA&NR=1
So sad, I almost got to see Chinoy when we were in La Serena!!!, but no one wanted to go and it was sort of expensive :(

Javiera Mena- Hasta la Verdad
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Wzp_VT-YkE

Some More Music

Haven't put up any music in a while, this guy is my new obsession!

Nano Stern-"Necesito un Canción"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Hd4AMaZ7So

Nano Stern- "Casualidad"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQbdgZdWTQY&feature=related

October 4: Gracias a La Vida...

Word of the Day: cantautor/a- singer- songwriter

Happy Birthday to Violeta Parra! She was one of the most prominent artists in the folk/protest music movement in Chile in the 1960s before she committed suicide.

Here's one of her most famous songs! There's also a version by fellow Chilean songstress Mercedes Sosa that is very famous, if not more so. Sorry, I can't seem to get videos embedded in the blog.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW3IgDs-NnA

These stanzas really sum up my experience in Chile:

Gracias a la vida que me ha dado tanto
Me ha dado la marcha de mis pies cansados
Con ellos anduve ciudades y charcos
Playas y desiertos, montañas y llanos
Y la casa tuya, tu calle y tu patio

Gracias a la vida que me ha dado tanto
Me dio el corazón que agita su marco
Cuando miro el fruto del cerebro humano
Cuando miro el bueno tan lejos del malo
Cuando miro el fondo de tus ojos claros

My less poetic attempt at an English translation:

Thank you to life, which has given me so much
Given me march in my tired feet
With them I've crossed cities and puddles
Beaches and deserts, moutains and plains
And your house, your street and your patio

Thank you to life, which has given me so much
Given me my heart which marks my life
When I see the fruit of the human mind
When I see the good so far from the bad
When I see the hidden in your clear eyes

Also, pretty much completed unrelated, but I found an interesting article that talks about mining safety and economic impact in Chile. WOOOO. Someday, I will stop being such a nerd, I swear.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11467279

Chilean Music for Your Listening Pleasure!

Chilean music is so good, and since it makes me very happy I would like to share some.

Juana Fe (saw them Saturday!)- Callejero
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRPXl6fqImw

Chico Trujillo (saw them Sunday!)- Loca
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwtcyXl5y9c

and the song of the bicentenario? something like that. Ay Cariño
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMA2YAJiRNc

PedroPiedras- Intelligencia Dormida
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFACePrQvdQ&feature=related

Who Needs the Swedes? Chileans Can Do Cold Rainy Day Music Too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcKJnF5dI-M