5 songs to discover in San Diego in October

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This month, we're celebrating Hispanic heritage month in our five songs, music picks. We all spotlight five musicians and bands in the region who are either performing this month or just released new music. There's a broad range of styles coming out of the Latin X music scene in our region. And joining us to walk us through the playlist is KPBS arts editor and producer Julia Dickson Evans. Welcome

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Julia. Hi Marine

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And midday edition producer Harrison Pitino. Hi Harrison.

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Hello, Maureen. Good to be here.

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So let's start with Julia. Your first pick is stars by two, one, a band who need borough. Let's take a listen

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[inaudible].

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So who NEPA is an Indy dream pop band. They're based in Tijuana and it's a duo, but they'll perform at the full band sometimes. And their sound is just super earnest full of layered melodies and vintage guitar sounds kind of has a beach house vibe to me may put out a five track EPE self-titled last April, and it is absolutely gorgeous. And from the CPS standout track for me is this one stars it's sweet and hopeful, but a little bit tragic too. I love the line. Stars will guide you back to my arms. Definitely checks all the boxes for me, rich songwriting, and a really lush and dreamy sound

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And they also recently released a live session on YouTube. That is absolutely worth a listen. They play a beautiful version of stars on that too. And their social media posts suggests that they are recording new music right now, too.

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That's stars by one, a dream pop duo who need borough up next. We have the Logan Heights based surf punk trio beach, goons, and Harrison. You said there's a melancholy to the energy of this band.

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Yeah, that's right. Marine. So beach goons is the brainchild of Publix Avantis. Who's been the group sole members since the band's inception, their early work consisted of a lot of lo-fi rough around the edges garage rock, but as sense mellowed out and matured a little bit, which isn't to say that their newer tracks don't still have that same frenetic energy of their earlier work.

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Their music still retains the fast pace and jangly guitar accompaniment that we see in a lot of surf punk today, but also has this distinct mournfulness and introspection from a songwriting. The band performed songs in both English and Spanish. And on the Spanish side, I really like attract from there delicately named 2018 album hood rat scumbags. It's on the softer side of the repertoire, and it really captures these themes of sadness and youthful disillusionment that runs through a lot of their music. Here's the track shouldn't they

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That's Trinity by Logan Heights, very own beach goons, who you can see live at the observatory on October 7th and out this week, a new remix of Latin pop artists, Gabby Aparicio song, cortisone remixed by nine theory. Julia, tell us about Gabby Aparicio and the story of this track.

Speaker 2: (03:53)

Yeah, so it's a brand new remix of a 2019 track. So Gabby Aparicio is a pretty hardworking performer. It seems like she's constantly performing shows around town. Her family is from Uruguay and she was raised in Florida moving to San Diego about seven years ago and she was nominated for a 20, 20 San Diego music award for album Labella Vieta for the best world music category. And I really enjoyed that album. It really shows off her range, the sounds, the seamless mix of Latin influence and pop structures. And her voice is fantastic. She sings this track Corazon in Spanish, but she does sing some of her music in English to

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So Corazon was on that 2019 album and this remix gives it a pretty chill house or electronic spin. This is producer named theory, who, who worked on the remix and it just dropped a few days ago. I really like how true to the original, this remixes. It maintains a lot of the delicacy and the quiet groove, but just ramps it up a bit. And Gavi has a bunch of performances in town this month, including as part of little Italy. Artwalk that's this Sunday at 11:00 AM for her performance.

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Okay. We've been listening to the nine theory remix of Gabby Aparicio is cortisone Harrison moving to a mainstay of San Diego's Latin music scene. Tell us about the San Diego Latin jazz collective.

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Well, Maureen, as you can probably imagine the San Diego Latin jazz collective deals in you guessed it Latin jazz, although it's kind of not really easy to capture what you can expect from a typical show with just those two words. The genre itself is steeped in so many different music styles and traditions from Samba to bossa Nova. And a lot of its DNA comes from the music of Cuba and Brazil That said it's hard to overstate, just how great Latin jazz sounds in person cacophonous horn sections combined with driving rhythm and percussive elements make live, shows a must see the San Diego Latin jazz collected performs really lively renditions of the classics of the genre that are so popular for a reason. Here's their addition to the Sancho bono classic. John John,

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John, John, by the San Diego Latin jazz collective, who can be seen live every Thursday tonight included at tin roof in the Gaslamp. And finally, Ramona MES squat known as Bostitch from the legendary electronic music group. Nortech collective will perform a DJ set as part of the front galleries, 15 year anniversary celebration in October and along with singer Ruben Elberon they produced a track in 2020 Julia. Tell us about these artists and about convince on may.

Speaker 2: (07:41)

Yeah, let's start with Ramon, Ms. CRA, otherwise known as busty beach this spring. He was featured in a special port of entry podcast. One of our moved by music episodes and he explored how he was on track to becoming a dentist until finally moving into being one of the most influential players in the, in the Mexico on border region, electronic music worlds, and as Nortech collective, they got to Latin Grammy nominations for their album, Tijuana sessions, volume three, that was in 2008. And they've recently been putting out a string of singles, including this one, convinced them a with vocalist Ruben Albarran convinced him a is lively with their really textured combination of folk, Sonic undertones, and then some really fuzzy beats and lyrics that feel almost haunting kind of playful, but a little dark edge tingle

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[inaudible] [inaudible]

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And Julia, you can see Nortech collective at the front gallery in San Ysidro on October 16th. Tell us a little bit about that.

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Yeah. The front is celebrating their 15th anniversary with a bunch of programming throughout October. It all revolves around a special exhibition that takes place that opens October 7th, but definitely get the 16th on your calendar for this Nortek DJ set. Tickets are free, but they're limited to just 50 people. And the RSVP list opens up on October 1st at 10:00 AM. And this will be a chance to check out the art and hear some great music too.

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And we've been listening to Nortex convince a may. You can find a playlist of all these tracks on our website. I've been speaking with KPBS arts editor and producer, Julia Dickson Evans and midday edition producer Harrison Pitino. Thank you both so much.

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Thank you, Marine exploring.

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Oh yeah.

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