What is narcoculture and why does it make artists succeed?

Maybe all of us who listen to Peso Pluma We remember the first time we did it, because it was surely the first time we heard a lying down. Yes, this explosive subgenre that mixes the music of traditional Mexican corridos with lyrics and styles coming directly from trap and hip hop.

With repeated themes around hedonism, drug use, sex, love and heartbreakhave become the new preferred style of youth beyond Mexican borders, even in countries where Anglo-American music has triumphed almost exclusively, such as the United States.

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In 2023, the explosion of corridos that ensured Featherweight 21 entries on the list Billboard It also contributed to taking regional styles to another level (mariachi, norteño, sierreño…) that made names such as Grupo Frontera, Fuerza Regida or Carín León resonate strongly, collaborating with the most mainstream references such as Bad Bunny, Shakira and Maluma, respectively.

Starting from this point, at WECB we want to address a question that many of us have asked ourselves. What is now this phenomenon of lying corridos that we have not seen since the trap fever? Can the unprecedented success of artists like Peso Pluma really happen in such a short period of time? For this we have to understand the context where this music is developed and consumed, and therefore, the meaning of key elements such as narcoculture and the role it plays in the triumph of the corridos tumbados, also nicknamed in some cases “narcocorridos”.

The ‘started from the bottom’: narcoculture, succeeding from below and becoming a “real G”

The unbridled success of Double P has led us to ask ourselves many questions, including: What was your life like before fame? and the components that have led him to be the Mexican artist with the highest positions on international charts. As a result of his success, there have been several academics who have pointed out the so-called “narcoculture” as the background that can explain the explosion of the corridos tumbados and the Jalisco artist.

“(The success of Peso Pluma) is related to the issues of mass media and social networks that generated an identity about our country, but it is closely linked to drug trafficking, which is very present within our imagination and within our society. (…) They are like superheroes or references, they seek to have respect, mainly. It doesn’t have a great voice, it is the conjunction of different factors, is to feel identified that had not been represented by that social sector, they want to become like them. Now being a Featherweight is the model to follow,” said Mexican anthropologist Horacio Mendizábal in an interview with Infobae.

Narcoculture, according to academic studies, is a term that coins the set of elements and collective imaginaries, customs, forms of identification and relationships that have been created through the problem of drug trafficking, which has impacted society at different levels, also in terms of cultural production. And although the illicit consumption and trade of narcotics is an international and globalized problem, drug trafficking and its effects have become one of the most determining elements in Latin America.

Same In Mexico there has been an increase in generalized violence since the era of the drug war in 2006, with the expansion of crimes such as extortion, kidnapping, human trafficking and major crimes driven by significant increases in drug dealing crimes, which have increased by 149% in the last decade.

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Understand this context of general crisis in the country is key to understanding the identifying elements that connect the public—especially the younger generations—with the romanticization of drug use and crime. In the same way that hip hop was born in the African-American communities of the 70s in the New York Bronx, or the trap that exploded in Georgia, Atlanta, in the 90s, reaching countries like Argentina through the rap battles streetthe corridos tumbados have become popular in a historical context marked by the crisisyouth precariousness and marginalization, where drug consumption and the adoption of culture gangsta It is the basis of socialization underground.

“Music is a reflection of any social context and it is for this reason that we can sometimes divide its audience so sectorally. Both genders are born and develop around drugs: the trap arises as a result of the trap houses beginning as a marginal genre and the drug trafficking corridos. The lyrics show an unsweetened reality with which a certain audience can feel identified, or be possessed by the morbidity of entering a world that is not the one that belongs to you. “Both genders have a direct association with the working classes and the consequences of systematic marginalization,” he tells WECB. the musicologist and music industry expert Lorena Jiménez Martínez.

Commercial success and/or why drugs can be sold as something fun

Although the triumph of the figure gangstathe bad boys and the successful apology for drug use is more than accepted in different areas of culture with hip hop as the greatest exponent, it is normal to wonder how something that represents such a determining social problem can triumph in this way. Yes, why can drugs be sold as something fun? Well, because they are., if we only stayed with its recreational aspectwhich is precisely what songs in these genres do.

If we rewind a little in history, we can see that the corridos tumbados, which Mexican artists like Natanael Cano have brought back, are not a 100% new subgenre in the country.. To understand its development we would first have to go back to the corridos of the 19th century, which address different social situations at the time of Mexican independence.

Years later, the rhythms of rancheras and romantic ballads also collided with the cultural context that was beginning to emerge with drug trafficking, resulting in what was the first anthem that gave the signal to those nicknamed narcocorridos: the song “Contrabando y Traicion” by the Tigres del Norte. A controversial hit that ensured the ban of the subgenre in the country. A censorship that, by the way, has also wanted to be carried out with the songs of Peso Pluma 50 years later: These types of songs have been banned by the Tijuana council.

However The component that makes these new corridos tumbados successful is that they focus solely on the most recreational and fun aspect of hedonistic pleasures, such as drug consumption.. Unlike their origins, these new letters and styles they leave out the context and social problems —in short, its most political dimension—, to welcome a more mediatizable message. This joins a need for identity references and the strong emergence of regional styles (something that could also explain the rise of K-Pop or Indian music, for example) in a musical panorama that tends towards homogenization in a globalized world, according to Jiménez.

“If we focus on what is intrinsically musical, the corridos tumbados respond to an identity need. Due to the consequences of globalization and the emptying of identity in artists, regional sounds are introduced into the interests of singers, regardless of the country we are talking about. They need to connect in some way with deep-rooted sounds that have been diluted due to the homogenization that has been taking place for decades,” says the musicologist.

In this sense, The popularization of the corridos tumbados can be equated, as we indicated before, with the boom of Spanish-speaking trap in Spain or Argentina —whose lyrics, by the way, also revolve around the apology of drugs and the presumability of what gangsta. “Its popularization and international introduction was practically the same way; Trap was a niche genre for a few years until its sounds were introduced into the mainstream. mainstream and in some way there were national representatives, in the case of Spain PXXR GVNG, Dora Black, etc., who made the message that came from the United States understood in the best way in Spanish society. Both genders are absorbed, emptied and exposed and internationalized by accepted and visible faces.”explains Jiménez.

In short, the sudden success – although if we review its historical development, perhaps it is not so sudden – of the corridos tumbados can be understood through various cultural elements, such as the concept of narcoculture itself, but also by the identity needs present in the industry that lead this subgenre and these artists to connect directly with the younger generations.