Playing this year at La Tocada Music Festival is a wonderful band from Guadalajara, Jalisco: Porter! Since the release of their 2015 Latin Grammy nominated album, "Moctezuma", Porter has been traveling a lot. From playing different venues to several festivals to touring around the world, they are currently finishing up their newest album whose release date has not been confirmed, but it is set for sometime this fall! Ever since David Velasco joined Porter as the vocalist, the band has seemed to revamp and transform into this amazing energy that is full of stories of Mexico’s past while paying tribute to their roots. Not only that, but their sound is stronger than ever. It just makes it overall more exciting to see what new path they take on their new album. This past week I got a chance to catch up with Victor “Villor” Valverde, guitarist and pianist for Porter, as the band prepares to play a few shows in California as they head up to play La Tocada being held at L.A’s historic park on August fourth. I started our conversation by asking Villor whether Porter was excited to play at La Tocada since this also happens to not be the first time Porter has played in L.A. “We are happy to be back in California we always have fun. We will be presenting some of the new material as well as playing our old stuff. We really want to connect with the people out there and where better than California.” As someone that has never seen Porter live, I asked Villor what one could expect of one of their shows. “All of our shows are one unique. None are the same. We are going to play some new songs, which will bring a dynamic curve to the show. We have never played Cuxillo over there and we will be playing it as well.” He also mentioned that the band will be bringing in the energy, it will be fresh and they will be playing the best of Porter. It’s really exciting to know that Porter will be playing some of their new material at La Tocada, especially since they have not released an album since 2014. I took the chance to ask Villor if there is anything he could tell me about the new album whether it would also be inspired by a book like "Moctezuma" or something else. He mentioned that this new album is rather based on their life experiences and emotions and the “magical world” that involves that. “We wanted to take a new direction with it in which we broke down our paradigms and we each created our own worlds. The album itself will be very emotional and epic. Lots of different sounds and psychedelic as well.” It sounds epic already! While the conversation took a new turn, I asked Villor what were Porter’s favorite things to in Los Angeles to which he quickly answered, “we love going into shops with instruments, but we also like going to bazars and local shops. We like getting to know the local culture as well. We always try connecting with the city one way or another. We also love going downtown and I personally love going to look at paintings. Part of our history and blood is there (L.A) as well.” There is no doubt there are not only a lot of cultures within L.A, but there are a lot of Latino communities around there and from that there is great Latino inspired art, music, and food. It’s easy to see why Villor brought that last part up. Porter is a band that is constantly learning and trying to sort of “teach” their audience what they learn through their music and I asked whether there was anything specific that was inspiring them at the moment or at the time of making the new album and he said there were a lot of things that were inspiring them. Whether it was a movie like “Historia Sin Fin” to “Labyrinth” or even the “Goonies”. “We also listen to all kinds of music, especially psychedelic music like that from the 60’s and 70’s. A mix of all those things helps us create a new “world”. There is so much inspiration from everywhere that at the time of “building” it, it feels like we created something completely new.” There is no doubt that Porter’s music is something new and other worldly. It is unique and their perspective on it is as well. I hope that people can take a moment to check them out whether it is listening to them for the first time or watching them at La Tocada. Photos by Diego Lucero.
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