Sounds Familyre
2008
Rio
About This Album
Following a five-year sabbatical, Aterciopelados staged an acclaimed comeback in 2006 with Oye, a Latin Grammy-winning album on which they returned to the Caribbean folklore-inflected rock of their mid- to late-'90s prime. Río, the follow-up album to Oye, is similarly styled, more reminiscent of La Pipa de la Paz (1997), the album that firmly established Aterciopelados as one of the leading alternative rock bands in Latin America, than subsequent efforts such as Caribe Atómico (1998) or Gozo Poderoso (2001) on which the band more freely experimented with different styles, particularly electronica. While Oye and Río are generally similar in style, they differ in a couple ways. For one, Río is lyrically thematic, often concerned with environmental awareness. It's not a full-fledged concept album, but from one song to the next, vocalist/lyricist Andrea Echeverri rarely strays far from environmental issues -- in fact, the sound of rushing water fills the gap between songs, reinforcing the concept of environmental awareness -- and when she does touch upon non-environmental issues, she remains politically engaged and socially conscious. Secondly, though Río isn't as stylistically freewheeling as Caribe Atómico or Gozo Poderoso -- to their detriment, some believe -- never veering too close to what one might even casually describe as electronica, it's more adventurous musically than Oye.
Track List (try tracks 1,4,5,6,8,9,11 and 13)

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