Release O.S.D.B. – Tropical Gueto Album

Posted On By Andrés

So we are really happy to release this new Album by the Mexican Artist O.S.D.B. aka. Original Son del Barrio. Tropical Gueto comes with 10 Tunes playing with a collection of sounds ranging from Digital Cumbia and Hip-hop to Reggae and Tropical Bass. The Album is available Digital and Vinyl will be released July 17.

Tell me when did you start working on that album and how did a Mexican living in Rome (at that time) and a German meet?
We started producing the album at the end of 2018, after meeting the DJ and producer Andres Digital, who had published on his social networks that he was looking for singers for his new productions. I wrote to him and sent him one of my songs “Pura Cumbia Buena” so he could check my style. He liked it a lot and sent me some riddims so I could choose one. I took one of this riddims and recorded a free style and the song “La Wacha” was born. Soon after this I organized some dates in Rome with Andres Digital to raise funds and make a video. It was there that we talked about producing an EP starting with these two songs and on a tour of Paris and Amsterdam we decided to turn it into an album that we called Tropical Gueto.

How did you do the work on the album? Seems not easy over that distance.
It was a slow process that had different breaks because of personal reasons. Some songs I wrote in Rome, others in Amsterdam, recording in my home studio. We finished the album during the Covid lockdown in Monterrey, Playa del Carmen, and Germany. Suddenly I would produce a beat and I would send it to Andres for him to put his magic on it, or he would send me another beat and I would write and record my voices. But we never knew that the result would be that varied, so we had a lot of fun producing this heavyweight album together.

When did you start the project Original Son del Barrio and why did you change the name to O.S.D.B.?
Original Son del Barrio started as a band in Playa del Carmen in 2009. I had arrived in the Mexican Caribbean from Monterrey looking for opportunities to reactivate myself in music, since I had started in the mid-90s as a rapper. In Playa del Carmen I met Tony Paz from the Bamboo group to whom I talked about my project that was a fusion of Cumbia, Reggae and Rap. So, we started working and recruiting musicians and put together a band that was very successful in the Riviera Maya playing at the best beach clubs and festivals in the Caribbean. After several years changing musicians, I decided to continue as a soloist and in 2023 I changed the name to O.S.D.B and Original Son del Barrio became the slogan of the project.

Quintana Roo, Monterrey, Rome….are the places where you’ve been living lately. They’re 3 really different places. How different life must be in each one of them!
They are very different! Monterrey is a very important industrial city, life is faster than in big cities, people are in a hurry, more stressed, a lot of violence. On the other hand, when I moved to Quintana Roo everything was slower and more relaxed, living right by the sea, swimming daily and getting coconuts from the palms. Rome’s another world, it’s like living in a museum, for me it was very inspiring to get there and start another stage, in another culture, another language, but I was fortunate to meet great musicians and introduce myself as an emerging artist on the local scene, since I was the first Mexican artist doing cumbia and I feel very proud to have achieved it.

Balas Perdidas – In the 90s there was a lot of gang violence in MTY, people got killed and, lately, also the whole nightlife. How is life in Monterrey today?
Well, I left Monterrey in 2008 for my own safety because I had taken some bad steps and the cartels had entered life there, controlling the entire city… many friends were murdered in very violent ways. I managed to escape. That sad stage left a mark that can never be erased. We felt like owners of the street and we went like lost bullets through life. Currently, the violence continues, but it is no longer so strong and the nightlife that was silent for many years has been reactivated.

Mama Chango – Climate is changing but it seems hard to change the industries and people’s habits. The Amazon rainforest is getting felled for commercial reasons. Mama Chango is crying: “What can we do?”
Pollution worldwide is unfortunate. We are the true plague as a species that is infected by power ambition. We must become aware and really make a commitment as inhabitants of this planet. Even though it seems like everything is lost, there are still good people with real ideas to combat climate change, but those at the top who control the global sphere do not care about anything, they only want more power, and it is time to wake up and put a stop. For that reason, I wrote the song Mama Chango and Fuck Babylon when I arrived in the Caribbean and saw how they had destroyed the jungle and mangroves to build their hotels. As an artist I have activated us musically, although I do not consider myself an activist, since I feel that I should be more committed, but at least we are contributing a grain of sand.

All that Links -> check the Tree

Vinyl will be available July 17.
In September we will release the Album Tropical Gueto Remixed on Hawaii Bonsai Records. It will come with 11 Remixes by Dvniel, Peter del Rio, Nat Barrera, Asagi Saundo, Maldito Final Feliz, Zlatan, Dj Saeg, Kalumet, El Satanico, El Extravagante

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