It’s not every day that Washington, DC gets a visit from an experimental psychedelic band who blend tropical elements like cumbia and salsa into their mix, so when we heard that The Meridian Brothers from Bogota, Colombia were playing Tropicalia on June 18, we got a little excited.
And for the record, there’s no actual brothers in the Meridian Brothers. The group is a experimental-tropical music project, active since 1998 and lead by Frente Cumbiero’s guitarist Eblis Alvarez. Stripped of conventional and convenient genre tags, this group maintains an intricate balance between highly experimental instrumentation and deep-rooted tropical rhythms of the ’60s and ’70s, integrating elements of Colombian and Peruvian Cumbia, Highlife, as well as Latin-American and Argentine Rock.
The band has released over 7 albums of material. We first encountered the group’s distinct sound through some 7″ singles released on the New York label Names You Can Trust and the British label Soundway records in the last few years, but that was all we got. The promise of a tour or a chance to see them in the US was slim based on the fringe marketability of weirdo music, but the believers at Barbes in Brooklyn moved some mountains and the group’s doing a brief US tour in June with a stop in DC.
To commemorate the occasion, The Vinyl District is partnering with Names You Can Trust and Multiflora Productions to give away a pair of tickets AND a copy of the “Lamento Calavera” 7″ that comes packaged in a supreme weight picture cover sleeve on recycled board and sealed with a kiss!
Also includes unlimited streaming of “Lamento Calavera” via the free Bandcamp app, plus a high-quality download in MP3, FLAC, and more.
Enter to win a pair tickets and the 7″ single by citing in the comments below why you’d want to check out these genius prophets of Colombian weirdness. We’ll choose one winner for the pair of tickets and the 7″ on Wednesday, June 17. Our winner will be notified directly via email.
THURSDAY, JUNE 18
Meridian Brothers (Bogota, Colombia)
Cigarette
Time Is Fire
Alumbra DC
Doors 8PM
$10 ADV | $12 Day of Show
Tropicalia
2001 14th Street, NW (Lower Level)
Washington, DC 20009
Get tickets HERE.
