MEXICO CITY — Rawayana, a band composed of Venezuelan émigrés whose trippy, Caribbean-soaked pop has earned it international acclaim, used to be driving top.
Overdue remaining yr the crowd had simply been nominated for a Grammy, been showed for this month’s Coachella lineup and used to be about to liberate a brand new album with the loved Colombian band Bomba Estéreo. And after two years of close to nonstop traveling all over the world, Rawayana used to be making ready an epic homecoming: celebratory concert events throughout Venezuela that bought out virtually once they had been introduced.
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However in December, days prior to the excursion used to be to begin, the band that has at all times noticed its track as a safe haven from Venezuela’s turbulent political panorama used to be itself embroiled in politics.
Venezuela’s authoritarian chief, Nicolás Maduro, whom Rawayana criticized remaining yr after he declared victory in a rigged election, delivered a fiery televised speech wherein he lambasted the band and a success music it had simply launched, calling it “terrible” and an insult to Venezuelan womanhood.
Venues started disavowing Rawayana, which used to be compelled to cancel its excursion.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro
(Matias Delacroix / Related Press)
“Till additional realize, that is how we are saying good-bye to our nation,” it wrote on social media.
Band chief Alberto “Beto” Montenegro mentioned he used to be saddened via Maduro’s assaults, however now not shocked. The 36-year-old singer and his bandmates are a part of the biggest diaspora on the earth — amongst just about 8 million Venezuelans who’ve fled dueling political and financial crises over the past decade — and their nation’s leaders had lengthy discovered new techniques to disappoint them.
However Venezuelans, they knew, had been not anything if now not resilient. And so the bandmates picked up their tools and stored doing what they’ve at all times executed: Glance ahead, and play songs for far-flung compatriots eager for the sounds of house.
“There are such a large amount of unsightly issues going down on the earth,” Montenegro mentioned just lately whilst in Mexico Town with Bomba Estéreo frontwoman Li Saumet to advertise their new super-group, Astropical. “However we attempt to keep positive and transfer from love. We are hoping our track serves to heal.”
Contributors of Rawayana in Hollywood on Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025.
(Ringo Chiu/For De Los)
The contributors of Rawayana — Montenegro, Antonio Casas, Andrés Tale and Alejandro Abeijón — had been nonetheless children when leftist Hugo Chávez gained the presidency in 1998 and started nationalizing Venezuela’s industries and consolidating energy.
They began via importing tracks to the web in school and briefly received a following. At a time when the rustic’s political context used to be increasingly more heavy, their reggae and funk-infused sound used to be gentle — ruled via danceable songs about weekends on the seaside and cheeky covers of reggaeton hits.
“Song for us used to be like an get away hatch,” mentioned Montenegro. The band invented the title Rawayana, which it imagined as a far off island a long way from the actual global and its issues. Its first album, in 2011, used to be known as “Licencia Para Ser Libre.” Permission to Be Unfastened.
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However because the band grew in reputation, and began taking part with one of the crucial nation’s maximum completed musicians, Venezuela used to be falling aside. In 2013, Chávez died and Maduro took energy. The economic system plummeted, homicides soared, and Caracas was some of the bad towns on the earth.
The capital’s as soon as thriving nightlife, with its packed salsa and meringue golf equipment, went darkish. After a number of of the band’s contributors had been in brief abducted, they determined to go away.
“There used to be not anything, no alternatives,” mentioned Montenegro. “The one factor shall we do used to be sing in non-public concert events for rich individuals who may just pay for them, or do executive gigs. And we didn’t like both of the ones paths.”
The band contributors lived between Miami and Mexico Town. Their paths in another country — aided via report firms that helped procure visas — had been more straightforward than the ones of maximum Venezuelan migrants, who’ve scattered all over the world looking for alternative and protection.
Rawayana on the Latin Grammys in 2024.
(Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Pictures for The Latin Recording)
Whilst in another country, Rawayana stored making track for the ones again house — going again to Venezuela when conceivable to play unfastened concert events. However they had been additionally changing into, as Montenegro describes it, “the soundtrack for the diaspora.”
The band traveled repeatedly, taking part in vigorous concert events any place Venezuelans had settled, from Barcelona to Omaha, Neb. Venezuelan flags flew at each display.
Migrant existence is difficult, mentioned Orestes Gómez, a Venezeulan-born percussionist who excursions with Rawayana. “Folks need to come and experience like they’re again in Caracas.”
“Each time they play, their track is impeccable, and the vibe is simply improbable,” mentioned César Andrés Rodriguez, a track manufacturer from Venezuela who now lives in Miami. “Everyone is playing themselves, dancing. I’ve by no means noticed a foul display.”
The band continues to make sunny, funky pop that gives an escapist trail. “You don’t want a visa to be at liberty,” Montenegro and rapper Apache croon at the music Top.
However Rawayana has increasingly more touched on political issues. One music on their 2021 album, “Cuando Los Acéfalos Predominan” (When the Headless Predominate), presented a veiled critique the corrupt elite that govern Venezuela, describing non-public events the place waiters serve “champagne bottles value 5 instances greater than your grandmother’s pension.”
Protesters show towards the respectable election effects mentioning that President Nicolás Maduro gained reelection in Caracas, Venezuela, Monday, July 29, 2024, the day after the vote.
(Cristian Hernandez / Related Press)
Closing yr, with discontent over Maduro at an all-time top, Venezeula’s opposition had top hopes that it might have the ability to easiest him within the nation’s intently watched presidential election.
Proof accrued via unbiased observers suggests opposition candidate Edmundo González gained handily, however election officers declared Maduro the winner. Venezuelans in and out of doors the rustic screamed fraud.
“Venezuela has been dwelling a perfect fraud for a few years … an ideological, ethical and moral fraud,” Montenegro advised Billboard. “Sadly we don’t seem to be shocked via some other electoral fraud, we have now already noticed all of it.”
Protesters conflict with police right through demonstrations towards the respectable election effects mentioning President Nicolas Maduro’s reelection, the day after the vote in Caracas, Venezuela, July 29, 2024.
(Matias Delacroix / Related Press)
The assaults from Maduro got here a couple of months later. His goal: a success music Rawayana made with the artist Akapellah known as “Veneka.”
The music, which was some of the listened-to songs remaining yr in Latin The us, sought to assign new which means to the slur “veneco,” which has been used to explain Venezuelan migrants in neighboring nations comparable to Colombia.
“The place are the venecan girls who constitute?” the music asks. “Anyplace she is going, the entire global is aware of she’s the boss.”
“We needed to make use of it as an emblem of resilience,” Montenegro mentioned. “It used to be like, ‘I don’t care what you name me. We’re the most efficient. Length.’”
However Maduro slammed it. “The ladies of Venezuela are known as Venezuelans with recognize and dignity … now not venecas!” he mentioned at a rally. The chief known as the music “insulting” and alleged the band used to be “seeking to disfigure our id.”
Within the days after Rawayana used to be compelled to cancel the excursion, the band contributors sunk into despair.
Venezuela’s leaders had already devastated their nation. “Now they had been seeking to benefit from our luck to generate information,” Montenegro mentioned.
However there have been excellent issues at the horizon. Comparable to Rawayana’s giant night time in February, once they was the primary Venezuelan act to win a Grammy for easiest Latin rock or choice album.
Once they authorised the award, Montenegro named a dozen Venezuelan musicians in a rhymed speech and instructed his countrymen to stay their heads up.
Then, there used to be the marvel announcement to fanatics of an album with Bomba Estéreo.
Closing yr, Saumet reached out to Rawayana to collaborate on a unmarried. Issues flowed so smartly within the studio they went on report a complete album.
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Astropical kicked off a excursion in Mexico Town remaining month, and can play the Hollywood Bowl Sept. 7.
Whilst they had been running, the musicians bonded over the similarities in their nations — the difficulties Venezuelans face now replicate the violence that plagued Colombia within the Nineties.
And after Rawayana discovered itself attacked via Maduro, Saumet gave Montenegro some recommendation.
Luck, she mentioned, at all times comes with difficulties. “The larger the tree, the larger the shadow.”
However adversity, she mentioned, continuously paves the way in which for artwork.
“Essentially the most impactful track comes from tough scenarios,” she mentioned.
For Montenegro, what issues maximum are the band’s listeners. “We now have the toughen of the folk,” he mentioned. “So I don’t thoughts that a lot.”
