Category: Authors

Authors, Chicano Music, Chicano Rock, Land of A Thousand Dances

Chicano Rock & Land of a Thousand Dances

Mona Alvarado Frazier

I love museum’s, big ones, dinky ones, modern, old, doesn’t matter. And I love music, oldies, newies, R & B, even some rap (my kids could not believe me when I played Eminem and Snoop Dog a few years ago) but back to the point. When a museum offers a historical look at music, culture, and language that’s all it takes for me to attend a function at my county museum.

Yesterday I attended “Chicano Rock! The Sounds of East Los Angeles,” produced by Jon Wilkman. I heard it played on PBS, but I must have missed it. Netflix also carries the documentary.

The film is based on the book, Land of A Thousand Dances by Tom Waldman and David Reyes. The cover is from artist George Yepes. The authors trace the history of Chicano music in Los Angeles from the legendary Lalo Guerrero, Cannibal and the Headhunters, to Tierra, Los Illegals, and Ozamatli.

La Serenta by George Yepes

For an hour I went down memory lane with the Oldies my cousins listened to: Richie Valens, Thee Midniters, Premier’s and others. Then we proceeded to the ELA marches, Brown Berets, and cruising. Yes, I was a cruiser, from Oxnard’s Saviers Road to Whitter Blvd. in Whitter and most towns in between. The music of Tierra, El Chicano, and Redbone blared on my cassette player.

The next era was new to me. I think I was still listening to Tierra, War, and a variety of other music when the Plugz, Los Illegals, and Brat entered the scene. Either that or I didn’t listen because it was punk. The book includes Quetzal, rappers Kid Frost and Lighter Shade of Brown from the early 90’s, but this has been left out of the documentary, possibly because the film was made in the 90’s and it took several years to complete.

The evening got me thinking of the Gen X and Y (or the Millennial’s as post 1985’ers are called) Although I tried to get my Y’s to attend they wouldn’t, even though they are music lovers. But their era is 1995 + and I don’t know if this generation is into the politics like El Chicano, Los Lobos, and Rage Against the Machine were.

I’d love to see a 3rd edition of the book “Land of A Thousand Dances,” which includes 1995 to 2010 as well as an updated “Chicano Rock.” But until then I’ll continue down memory lane, for the next week, as I play some of my favorites from “Chicano Rock!” on my jukebox. I hope you enjoy them and they bring back memories of your youth, your parents, or your older brothers/sisters. For me, they are the sound of from my barrio, back in the 70’s, and I loved reliving the era when I saw this film and read this book.

Alexander McCall Smith, Authors, Brandon Skyhorse, Jaime Becerra, Kathy Cano-Murillo, Matthew Munoz, Rebecca Skloot, Summer reads for adults, T. Soli

Toes in the Sand, Nose in a Book

Mona Alvarado Frazier

This catchy byline is the title for Border’s summer book list. Now if we could just find the time to read the entire list and have the money to buy all the books. Since that’s not happening for most of us, let’s see what we can do with a shortage of time and money.
The following books are award winners, an Oprah pick, or on Amazon’s four and five starred review list. There are multi-cultural characters and settings that will take you from Bakersfield to Vietnam. Genres include adventure, biography, thriller, romance, and non-fiction. Best of all they are under $12 and two of them are available for e-reading devices.

Every night is Ladies Night by Michael Jaime Becerra. A humorous and poignant story collection by a writer who observes with great skill, leading him to portray ordinary scenes in the ongoing human drama. (Booklist)
What you see in the Dark by Matthew Munoz: In 1959, the Director (i.e., Alfred Hitchcock) arrives in Bakersfield, Calif., to film Psycho, along with the Actress (Janet Leigh). Providing counterpoint to the events surrounding the making of the iconic Hollywood film, including the search for a motel to serve as the exterior of the Bates Motel, is the story of locals Dan Watson and Teresa Garza, whose doomed love affair ends in murder. (Booklist)
Miss Scarlet’s School of Patternless Sewing by Kathy Cano-Murillo. The founder of popular http://www.craftychica.com pens her second Crafty Chica novel. Scarlet Santana has abandoned a promising engineering career to follow her passion for sewing. Cano-Murillo manages to extract much mirth from her cast of craftsters, each striving to transcend restrictive patterns in life and to defeat family expectations that are squelching self-expression. (Kirkus)

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. A fascinating story of medicine and family. Henrietta Lacks died from an aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her consent, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology. (Amazon)
The Double Comfort Safari Club by Alexander McCall Smith. The new installment in Smith’s bestselling series finds Mma Ramotswe traveling to the north of Botswana to visit a safari lodge, where there have been several unexplained and troubling events–including the demise of one of the guests. (Amazon)
Madonna’s of Echo Park by Brandon Skyhorse. Echo Park, the LA neighborhood down the hill from Chavez Ravine, is the setting for this novel-in-stories—a vivid portrayal of the lives of Mexican Americans who live and work there. Skyhorse weaves his characters—migrant farm workers, gardeners, dishwashers, bus drivers, house cleaners, gang members—in and out of his stories in various time frames. (Booklist)
The Lotus Eaters by Tatjana Soli. A unique debut novel that follows an American female combat photographer in the Vietnam War as she captures the wrenching chaos and finds herself torn 
between the love of two men.(Amazon)

There are tons of books out there for equal or less prices at swap.com, .99¢ Store, used book stores and for free (library). There is no excuse to relax and get your read on. So put your toes in the sand, your nose in a book, and don’t forget the sunblock.