By: Samantha Navarro
Metalachi
Slidebar
September 5, 2013
Metalachi has successfully fused popular '80s metal with mariachi riffs to create a style of music perfect for this crazy, multi-culti Southern California of ours, where gabachos wear lucha libre masks more than Mexicans and Mexicans rock out to Megadeth. They rocked the stage at the Slidebar in Fullerton Thursday night, as they do virtually every show.
El Cucuy, the trumpet player with platform boots, spiky shoulder pads and a crotch guard that doubles as a lemon squeezer that he uses onstage, announced he wanted start to rock “al estilo mexicano.” He began Thursday night with “El Son de la Negra,” the “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” of mariachi music, then seamlessly transitioned into “Back in Black” by AC/DC, while bumping his crotch back and forth for the entire performance. All the ladies in the house, especially those standing in the front lapped it up like their tías do it at a Thunder from Down Under show.
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Next came “We're Not Gonna Take It” by Twisted Sister, which had violinist Maximilian “Dirty” Sanchez (wearing a dog chocker and chain) give a dedication “Little Smiley” for bailing him out of jail with her college money before wowing the crowd with a solo. Metalachi then moved onto a Metallica potpourri–“Master of Puppets,” “One,” and “Enter Sandman”–before slipping into “Bark at the Moon” by Ozzy. After that humdinger, lead singer Vega brought an unsuspecting audience member onstage, sat her down and offered an almost too graphic dance while locking her to furry handcuffs on his belt while serenading her with “Every Rose Has Its Thorn.” El Cucuy, however one-upped Vega by serenading the prisoner to his supposed uncle Vicente Fernández's “Volver Volver” and “Por Tu Maldito Amor.” Ever the romantic, Cucuy announced he was ready to marry her and offer her dad a million pesos, “because that's like really ten dollars.”
There was no need to announce set lists–whether it was metal or mariachi, the crowd knew them all by heart, whooping and leaping to their favorite songs (they decide which songs to play by scoping out the crowd and figuring out whether it's a metal or wab crowd; Thursday's crowd, according to Metalachi, was a mix of beaner-weiners, metalheads, and a lot of sweaty chichis, latter being the only reason they live). “All I gotta say is there's a lot of abuelitas babysitting tonight!” Maximillian roared at one point. El Cucuy, meanwhile, shared this insight: you know you're around Mexicans when there are bulletproof ice cream trucks, and you celebrate your quinceañera the same day as your babyshower! Who the hell does he think he is–¡Ask a Mexican!?
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The group's usual guitar player, Ramon Holiday, couldn't be there, according to my conversation with the band after the show, because he had to babysit their little baby brother because their mom (they claim to be brothers) got pregnant from the coyote when she was crossing the border. “She's like 84 years old,” El Cucuy asserted, but she's really fertile, she's still having babies”–and that's only because she eats chorizo every morning.
This may have been one of the loudest Metalachi concerts ever, according to Vega. “That's how we like it. As long as everyone's having fun and they're screaming and showing their chichis and drinking.” Thursday's show was their last in OC before heading out to the Southwest to play shows in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Chichis Christ!
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