The history of Latin Bangers starts in 1996, when Renaldo “Ñeco” Peña & Jay
“Guako” Jaxon, both from Puerto Rico, met while they were studying at Full Sail Center for the Recording Arts in Orlando, Florida. Ñeco, that has studied piano most of his life, is an excellent singer and songwriter, whom lately has become a great guitar player, thanks to those nights of Parranda, Guako worked as an MC and DJ in the Club scene and in the world of “underground” music, music that is known today as Reggeaton. He also worked as a production coordinator of live events around the island of Puerto Rico.
A year after they met, they started experimenting with music at Guako’s house, a place where he had a corner with all his recording equipment. During this time, Ñeco was finishing his studies in film production and was getting ready to continue his studies in audio engineering. Guako had already finished his education and was working as a DJ in different clubs of the Orlando area. In early 1999, Guako got a job in the Audio Post Department at Discovery Channel Latin America in Miami. One day while talking to his friend Arami Camacho, he finds out about the existence of Sergio “Barbaro” Figuera, a Cuban born Master Control Operator, about his recording studio, and most important about his fame of “Party Animal”, fame that has become legend in a lot of places around Miami. Barbaro that studied music in Miami Dade Community College and FIU, has an incredible voice and has the capacity to reproduce almost any sound.
During a memorable “road trip” to a KISS concert in Mississippi, Guako while in the car, decides to start a Rap, Barbaro hears him and comes with the idea to record a song sometime. Guako doesn’t pay much attention to his comments. Little time later, Ñeco leaves his job of Audio Tech at Universal Studios in Orlando and moves to Miami, where is hired as a Master Control Operator at Discovery. It is here where he reunites with Guako and meets Barbaro.
THE BIRTH OF LATIN BANGERS
Guateke is born sometime in 2000; it was the song that unites Latin Bangers for the first time. Guako and Ñeco were working overtime at Discovery, on a boring twelve-hour shift. They were both in close rooms monitoring some networks, and while talking through an intercom they started singing meaningless things. While they were doing this, Guako starts singing freestyle “ Guateke, Guateke” and Ñeco immediately starts writing whatever Guako was singing so they wouldn’t forget eventually. At the time Guako & Ñeco were singing, Barbaro enters one of the rooms, hears the song and suggests recording the song at his home studio, so they would have something to play at their home parties. Guateke’s meaning was originally a party or get together, but in this case it was given a double meaning, making it seems that it was a drink that a “jeva” wanted with passion.
That’s how Latin Bangers was born. A group of three guys that got together and united their talents and experiences to tell stories about every day life from a comic perspective. Their genre is categorize as Latin pop, with strong influences from Rock, Ska & Reggeaton.
Little later, after recording Guateke, their first and only song, this became two, then three, four and the group realized that they had sufficient material to produce a full CD. Their first CD or album was called Guateke and was published in January of 2000 under their own independent label, MOJITO Records. In March 10th of 2000, the group made their debut, at the world known Festival “ Calle 8” in Miami. After this, Latin Bangers made some appearances in different TV and Radio shows around town.
THE CONTEST, THE NEW ALBUM
One day while Barbaro was listening to the radio, he hears a commercial about a talent contest sponsored by the radio station Power 96 and Coca Cola, it was called “The National Coca Cola Latinos Live Contest”. Almost immediately, Barbaro joins Ñeco at his home studio, located in his living room and arrange a song for Coca Cola that was originally written for Latin Bangers. The song was submitted right on deadline to participate in the contest. After a few weeks, the group was notified that they were finalists. Now they had to re-record the same song at a professional studio. This studio was The Hit Factory / Criteria in Miami, where the song was going to be sponsored by Coca Cola and Fuerte Marketing from New York. The song was recorded, after about three weeks without any news, Barbaro driven by anxiety, decides to call the main offices of Fuerte Marketing, and after a nice conversation with one of the agents, he asks for the results. She couldn’t believe his question, since she thought the group already knew, and in a very discreet way, informs him that Latin Bangers were the winners of the National Contest, but that she wasn’t authorized to deliver the news. The result were later received and made official through a letter. At that time, they had written 22 songs for a future album, in which in this case was going to be sponsored by the results of the competition, in other words by the contest prize which was the recording of a ten song album, sponsored by Coca Cola. Through Fuerte Marketing, the group meets the team from The Warehouse Recording Studios in Miami, were the pre-production and recording of the album was going to take place under the supervision of Gustavo Menendez, producer of such acts as Circo & Volumen Cero in February of 2004.
The album contains ten songs, in which the tradition of Latin Bangers is follow, but defining more in depth the unique style that characterizes them. A fusion of Reggeaton with other styles of music, including latin rock, ska, mambo, plena & rap, of course following the Latin Bangers concept. From this Cerveza Time is born, recorded at The Warehouse Studios in Miami, under the production and supervision of Travis Cook, Ruben Parra and Gustavo Menendez.
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