Los Kung Fu Monkeys

Don't let the name fool you. This isn't a gang of karate chopping primates. It's ska...Tijuana style.

"It sounds to me just like ska punk," says University of Arizona KAMP Student Radio engineering director Zack Stephens. "I was getting so into it I didn't even realize it was in another language."

The six piece band is comprised of vocalists Bernie and Paco, bassist Hassan and his brother guitarist Tarek, drummer Hecky and keyboardist Esteban. (Their last names were not listed on any of the band's various Web sites and efforts to contact them failed). The fresh outfit of musicians, changed over several times from its humble beginnings in 1998, make an almost seamless transition from the familiar stylings of American ska favorites like Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake to a hybrid of scratchy vocals and a dash of Mexican culture.

"It sounds like they combined ska from the mid-'90s with the newer version of screamo from today," says UA retail major Jacob Wexler.

Interestingly enough, ska was born under similar cross-bordering conditions. Ska enthusiast, UA history senior and KAMP general manager Karl Goranowski explains,

"The DJs would find really obscure American jazz records and then, after awhile, they started producing their own Jamaican music fusing jazz with local styles," says Goranowski. "Ska punk started as an outgrowth of the second wave ska movement which was in the '70s in England. Operation Ivy was the first to fuse the two."

The band's comprehensive Myspace page features both Spanish and English tracks, attracting fans on both sides of the border.

For more information on Los Kung Fu Monkeys visit their Myspace page at www.myspace.com/loskfm.

You Tube Presents the Los Kung Fu Monkeys:

Striking A Chord

Is it the place that makes the music or the music that makes the place? Like the chicken and the egg, sometimes it's hard to discern which came first. Border rock is a new term that attempts to categorize the hybrid sound that bridges Hispanic and American culture. This cross-pollination of communities could be the key to unlocking the extent to which the neighboring countries influence the creativity, mentality and political agenda of those inhabitants stuck in limbo between the towering border wall and Safeway's frozen chimichangas. Or...it could, just simply, rock. I'll do the research and you decide.