Mon Sep 16, 7:00 PM - Mon Sep 16, 10:00 PM
2477-2475 18th St NW, Washington, DC 20009

Community: Adams Morgan

Description

Throughout the 1970’s, Los Wembler’s released an astonishing three LPs a year. They toured constantly throughout the Amazon, with forays into Peru’s majors cities. They became Iquitos greatest musical export.

Event Details

ON SALE NOW!
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Presented in collaboration with Leon City Sounds and Multiflora Productions’s annual Flash of the Spirit music festival series!

LOS WEMBLER'S de Iquitos
Monday September 16, 2019
D: 7:00 // S: 8:00 PM
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In 1968, in Iquitos, the capital of the Peruvian Amazon, a shoemaker named Solomon Sanchez decided to form a band with his five sons. They were the first band in the Amazon to play popular local rhythms with electric guitars. The new hybrid they were creating would go on to have an enormous impact on South American popular music. Some of their songs, such as Sonido Amazonico or Danza del Petrolero became the most emblematic of this new cumbia amazonica movement.

The brothers were born and raised in Iquitos - the largest isolated city in the world. Iquitos boasts close to half a million inhabitants, but its nearest road is six days away by boat. The river and the forest are a big part of the culture, but the city remains a large urban center. Indigenous folklore and urban living have created a singular culture with the river dolphin and the mototaxi as its primary symbols.

The brothers’ main link to the outside world was the radio. In addition to their daily diets of Tahuampa, Pandillas and Criollo waltzes, long wave radio broadcasts would expose them to Colombian Cumbia, Brazilian Carimbo, Ecuadorian SanJuanitos, Venezuelan joropos – and psychedelic rock.

Curious to a fault, and willing to experiment, Los Wembler’s managed to incorporate all these styles in their playing. They loved Pinduca’s Brazilian Carimbó and covered some of his songs. Same with Ecuador’s Polibio Mayorga, who was also mixing local rhythms with tropical imports. Most of all, they loved the sound of electric guitars – especially with a wah pedal.

Cumbia proved to be the most popular and most adaptable rhythm and it became the key element in their music. Their very first tune was called Cumbia Amazonica, which became the name of the music itself.

The band’s name itself reflected both their traditional roots and their foreign influences. They combined the name of a local ethnic group – the Huambisa’s – with that of the British stadium Wembley, adding the extra ‘s because it seemed more rock and roll…

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