Cumbiamuffin

Australia’s premier cumbia orchestra Cumbiamuffin creates infectious, hypnotic tropical grooves with a ragga kick. If you like Ondatrópica, Frente Cumbiero, Ska Cubano and Lucho Bermúdez, you’ll love this band.

It was only a matter of time before cumbia hit Australia. After humbly coming to life on Colombia’s Caribbean coast, this rhythm—and everything it represents: its multi- ethnicity, its danceable pulse, its resilience—snaked its way up the mountains to reach Colombia’s urban capitals, Bogotá and Medellín, who transmitted the signal to Mexico, Peru, Argentina… Cumbia travelled, and wherever it landed it took hold, showing its flexibility, its ability to adapt to new environments.

Since forming in 2010, Cumbiamuffin has gained a lot of fans for cumbia, offering a twist on the genre that no one saw coming. They take their inspiration from cumbia’s brass band traditions, and also look further afield, to the big bands of Mexico and Peru, and even to the Caribbean, which is how their name came about. Cumbiamuffin represents the contraction of two musical styles that the group seamlessly bring together in one big, vibrant, joyous experience: cumbia and raggamuffin reggae.

Armed with the collective energy of two authentic Colombian vocalists, a seriously massive brass section, heavy bass, funky guitar, salsa piano and equally authentic percussion, the 15-piece band combines disparate ingredients into a deft mix that is both retro and futuristic, authentically traditional and yet also experimental. Put together by a collective of Colombian and Australian musicians, the project has the common vision of introducing the purest sounds of the golden era of orchestrated cumbia to Australian audiences, but with a little something more added to the formula to keep things fresh.

Having triumphantly conquered their home country’s competitive music scene with sold out shows at numerous festivals and well-known venues all over Down Under, Cumbiamuffin are poised to break out to a global audience with their debut self-titled LP on Peace & Rhythm, which you can find here.