by Kevin Vaughn

If you just so happened to jimmy the lock to my apartment and sneak inside sometime around January of last year, on a Friday or Saturday night between 11 and 12pm, the odds are remarkably favorable that you would’ve been witness to a spectacular pre-previa. Bomba Estereo’s explosive sophomore album “Estalla” blasting out of my pathetic computer speakers, the clanging sound of ice meeting glass from the nights first fernet and cola and me reaching the routine’s crescendo somewhere between “Fuego” and “La Boquilla”.

Experiencing them live last March at Club Niceto is one of the high moments on my live show trajectory. I have never seen a crowd energize so quickly. I screamed like a prepubescent girl when Li Saumet erupted onto the stage, jumped uncontrollably, sang along to every song I knew, mouthed the syllables of the ones I didn´t, and smiled with glee when the inebriated cloud of sweat next to me was slapped across the face by another girl for calling Saumet a less than churchy name. If I wasn´t a fan before, my new musical obsession was immortalized then and there.

It is an interesting switch to see the band and their stripped down collaboration with French videographer Vincent Moon, a two-part video project filmed in a day in Bogota. With the exception of “Raza”, the video highlights songs from their upcoming album which is set for a mid-2012 release. According to Saumet, the mood of the video is pretty representative of the upcoming release.

The Barranquilla native explained, “They are new songs, that search from within and talk about simpler things. “Estalla” had a lot to do with people, with politics, but it´s just as important to look within yourself, so the new album is a lot like that, calmer moments, moments that are much sweeter.”