Causecast

Since 1995, Venezuela’s Los Amigos Invisibles have been releasing albums and touring the world, picking up a Latin Grammy for Best Alternative Latin Album along the way. Causecast’s Brandon Deroche caught up with a few of the guys at this year’s Austin City Limit’s Festival to get their take on social change.

CC: Music festivals like this always remind me of a cultural shift I feel, or at least hope, is taking place on a larger level. Do you feel it?

Armando: Definitely, there’s so many interesting things happening culturally and so many things happening worldwide. Technology has been a part of it, definitely. The fact that you can pretty much have a pen-pal all the way in Turkey while you’re here and share the music with them and people being able to listen to music from all over, music has become a much more universal language then it was before. Not so long ago, 10-20 years ago, you would only have access to whatever record was in your local record store and whatever was put on your local radio station. Right now, it’s like an overwhelming overload of music and culture all around, so you really have to find your own calling within that melting pot and pick from there. That’s very interesting because it’s very democratic in a way, but also overpowering, overwhelming.

CC: Being a musician, how do you see your role in the change that’s happening, if any?

Armando: I had the chance to recently be at the U2 360 tour. Those guys, and Bono himself, he’s a super activist kind of guy. The fact that he can move such an amazing amount of masses and try and tell them what he thinks is right and also use the power that he has to speak to political figures and actually lend money from their shows. The whole (RED) Zone thing was all donated to the (RED) organization, for people with AIDS. Of course depending on where you’re at in the music pyramid, you’ll have more of the ability to express your thoughts to a larger audience. But music has always been either a means to release yourself from stress, or the means to express yourself and your ideas.

CC: Are there any causes in particular that you’re passionate about?

Armando: Individually, each one has their own stuff. I would say that personally I’m very concerned about the environment and also about gay rights. I think we should begin recognizing that no matter what your sexual preference is you should be able to live your life the way you want it to be.

Catire: I dont know, Los Amigos, we are not too loud about promoting a cause. As Armando said, each person maybe has something in which personally we’d like to be involved. Personally, I would say something like Live Earth. Something related to the conservation of the planet. You know, using less garbage, less plastic, recycled…that kind of thing. I would say I would dedicate my time to a cause like that, to preserve the earth.

Cheo: Yeah I think the band has been involved with a lot of benefits and whatever we can do as musicians and play, we do it whenever we can. But as a person, I’m part of the company of a nonprofit called AID for AIDS in New York. It’s gets AIDS medicines for pro-conscious, poor neighborhoods. Also, I’m involved in some Parkinson’s Disease research in Venezuela and part of the company of a wheelchair foundation. It’s my mother in law’s foundation, so I’m involved as well.

CC: The music industry has changed a lot since you’ve started even, do find things to be more difficult today to progress as a band?

Catire: Well I think actually having a band, no matter what time, has always been hard. Getting people together, doing the same work for a long period of time, so I think having a band has always been hard from day zero. The Beatles, the greatest band, they split. So these days, the music industry is kind of like mutating to some place nobody knows. But I think what I can recommend to people starting in this business is to be very passionate about what they do, and to believe in themselves. I mean, wherever the business is going to go, if they work hard… We found that those networks like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, and our website…there are like several thousand more that we don’t pay attention to, but the ones we pay attention to, we found is a good way to hear feedback from our fans.

CC: Who has been inspirational in your life to make you want to be active?

Cheo: I think there’s a lot of people that do that. The effect that music and people that surround musicians…U2, Michael Franti… The fact that musicians can raise awareness of some stuff that’s not under your nose or so obvious for a lot of people, it’s always a good situation. We definitely need to use that power.

CC: Has there been anyone in Venezuela?

Cheo: There’s a person later on that’s been in the spotlight which is an old musician, and old director called Maestro Abreu. He put together a program where like young kids from all over the country can learn how to play, they can learn music, and actually they’ll qualify to play in the orchestra in the city. So the best of those kids will play in the national orchestra and they’re touring all over the world. One of the best examples is Gustavo Dudamel, he came out of that place. A method called El Sistema. He came out of that and that’s a great example in Venezuela of how music can change a country. Those kids would be doing who knows what if they weren’t into music.

For more on Los Amigos Invisibles visit amigosinvisibles.com.