Three Rivers Arts Festival

Los Amigos Invisibles

12 May 2010 by Ross Scarano in Music

Hipsters catch lots of blame. One of the more recent accusation leveled at everyone’s favorite androgynous, irony-swaddled subculture is the resurgence of disco. Maybe you didn’t realize disco was cool again. (Admittedly, it’s cool with a somewhat limited section of music listeners, Lady Gaga fans aside.) For proof, look no further than New York label DFA Records and their most popular bands. While the walking American Apparel advertisements (i.e. hipsters) tend to coat this new-found love for disco in, say, 15 careful coats of irony, there are some bands coming at disco sincerely.

And why not? Disco is fun. Venezuelan group Los Amigos Invisibles is one such band. By seamlessly incorporating the infectious basslines and dancefloor ready rhythms of disco into their Latin pop tunes, they’re reminding us that maybe polyester leisure suits were the only reason we wanted disco dead.

How does a Venezuelan band end up playing disco (and funk and a bit of acid jazz)? Let’s not get ethnocentric; globalization makes anything possible. For the six members of Los Amigos Invisibles, playing American dance music was always a conscious decision. In 1991, the six musicians who comprise the band came together in Caracas to prove once and for all that dancing in Latin America should not be limited to salsa and merengue. Thus, Los Amigos Invisibles are a band with a mission statement: to get you on the dancefloor (even us doubly left-footed Americans).

In 1996, Los Amigos Invisibles journeyed to NYC and soon signed to Luaka Bop, the famous world music label started by David Byrne, human being extraordinaire and former frontman of Talking Heads. Byrne’s stamp of approval likely cements this band’s credibility for the rest of time. But for further convincing, there’s always the music.

This self-described “party band” released their sixth album last year, the cheekily titled Commercial. Despite the title, this album is not Los Amigos selling out. In fact, it might be their most acclaimed work to date. The 2009 Latin Grammys awarded Commercial Alternative Latin Album of the Year. With this album, Los Amigos expand their repertoire, dabbling in Daft Punk-esque house-pop and early 80s funk a la Prince. “Vivre Para Ti” basks in soft-rock smoothness that manages to make cheesiness sound inviting and wonderful. “Mentiras” could find it’s way into a 1980s teen comedy and nothing would feel out of place, even with the Spanish lyrics. Still, fat disco basslines and unmistakably Latin rhythms abound, proving that Los Amigos Invisibles are talented enough to stay true to the band’s beginnings without stagnating.

Three Rivers Arts Festival always embraces the dance floor. Last year Trombone Shorty blasted folks clean out of their seats with his inspired, James Brown style antics; and the year before, Lotus set heads to bobbing with a unique blend of electro pop and jam-band compositions. This year, Los Amigos Invisibles will give us a reason to push those gray plastic folding-chairs to the sides to clear a dance floor. A word of advice: please leave those platform shoes at home – you’ll only sprain an ankle on the grass.

Los Amigos Invisibles
7:30pm, Wednesday, June 9
Dollar Bank Stage at Point State Park