Popular Mexican groups are bringing their fusion to Houston
Though it often flies well under the radar of the American pop mainstream, the rock scene in Mexico has long offered a vital, energetic counterpart to what’s happening north of the border. In the
’90s, the folkloric indie-pop of Café Tacuba, the frenetic ska of Maldita Vecindad, the eclectic grooves of Kinky, the hiphop of Molotov and the more mainstream rock of Maná managed to make some headway with audiences outside of Mexico. More recently, the band Zoé co-headlined a U.S. tour with Toronto’s Metric.
Today, there’s a newer generation of indie bands from the country — including the likes of Hello Seahorse, Petite Amie, Young Tender, Norwayy, DRIMS and Policias y Ladrones (Cops and Robbers) — and two of the betterknown outfits, Porter and Little Jesus, are performing in Houston this month.
With their infectious eclecticism running from postpunk to prog-rock, Latin folk to pop, both Porter and Little Jesus represent a rock en español scene that has one ear cocked to what’s happening in the wider world of music and the other to their country’s own rich rhythmic heritage. Porter plays Rockefellers Sept. 24 and Little Jesus plays
White Oak Music Hall Sept. 25 and, in a month when there are so many high-profile concerts on the Houston concert calendar, from Bad Bunny to ZZ Top, these shows may be smaller in scale but not in impact.
Porter
This Guadalajara quartet’s dreamy, expansive style, that at times can be reminiscent of Peter Gabriel, Sigur Rós, the Cure, Local Natives, Röyksopp and Radiohead, has made it one of the more popular altrock bands in Mexico. The group has been nominated for three Latin Grammys and has played such major festivals as South by Southwest, Coachella and Mexico’s Vive Latino.
But it all almost didn’t happen.
After forming in 2004 and recording two albums, the band broke up in 2008 as singer Juan Son, with his distinctively keening vocal presence on such tracks as “Host of a Ghost,” went to pursue other
projects. But the group got back together in 2013 with new singer David Velasco (who bears a similar vocal presence to that of Son) and has been on a roll ever since. Over the course of the subsequent three albums — “Moctezuma” (2015), “Las Batallas” (2019), “La Historia Sin Fin” (2022) — the group has broadened its sound and crafted a collection of shimmering, hypnotic rockpop.
While there are obvious influences from beyond Mexico’s borders, the group can also dig deep into its cultural roots, as on the track “Ranchito,” which includes flavors of regional Mexican music, or the rhythms of “Cuxillo.” As with Café Tacuba, this approach
makes for an invigorating hybrid that should translate into a powerful live performance.
Little Jesus
Mexico City’s Santiago Casillas is a busy guy.
Not only is he the singerguitarist of the multigenre alt-rock band Little Jesus, he also has the (sometimes) French-language, electro-disco-psychedelic side project, Petite Amie, a group that just wrapped an American tour. But, on its own, Little Jesus sports a trippy, Flaming Lipsadjacent sound that has a wide range of influences, one that has been dubbed “tropipop” but is more substantive and less quirky than that label indicates.
Each of its three albums has gotten progressively stronger, with the most recent, “Disco do Oro,” reflecting the band’s growth in terms of melodicism, musicality and hooks. Tracks such as “Los Años Maravillosos,” “Los Ángeles, California” and “Fuera de Lugar” are some of the best songs in the band’s catalog.
As good as “Disco do Oro” is, the group tries to make its live shows something different. Casillas, after opening for the Rolling Stones in Mexico, told Miami New Times, “We love our records, but the live show is the best we can do — lots of energy,” he said. “We have rock parts, dance parts; it’s fun. At the beginning of a tour, we rehearse a few times a week so we have 30 songs to choose from.”
For a curated Spotify selection of tracks from
Porter and Little Jesus, search for “Best of Porter and Little Jesus” on Spotify.