It is hilariously and wonderfully clear that ASTROPICAL, the musical collaboration between members of Bomba Estéreo and Rawayana, was meant to be.
The moment I hop on to our scheduled video call by Zoom, Li Saumet and Alberto “Beto” Montenegro are already joking around on camera. They are in separate hotel rooms and Saumet is telling him how he should have answered a question in a previous interview.
“You’re supposed to say, music is politics!” Saumet says, humorously emphasizing and exaggerating the last three words. Beto laughs and provides his own exaggerated version of the phrase until their publicist politely gets us on track and they shift into serious-mode.
This dynamic between the two plays out in the same manner throughout the interview: serious moments punctuated by lots of jokes and lots of laughter as we discussed the group’s current tour, the album’s connection to astrology, how karaoke influenced the creation of the album, why this project may only last for a year, how they could tell I’m a Virgo, and more.
The interview below is lightly edited for clarity.
Beto: Sorry, I just woke up.
Li: Why? Where’d you go last night or what? [laughs]
B: No, that bus ... I sleep too much in that bus.
L: We are in a bus that we call "the Sarcophagus." We go to sleep and you don’t know if you’re dead or alive.
LA Taco: So you traveled by bus from Texas to California instead of by plane?
L: Across all the United States.
B: Yeah, we did the East Coast and we did Arizona, but we started in Florida.
LAT: Beto, is this your first time at the Hollywood Bowl? I think Li and Bomba Estéreo have played there before.
B: [To Li] For you it’s not the first time?
L: I think we played there once ... a long time ago.
LAT: So you have no idea what you’re getting into, Beto!
B: ¡Coño! It’s the first time. I know the venue and I know the importance, but it’s the first time. I really enjoy L.A. as a city and to make music. I really like this city, so I’m excited.
LAT: Have you played with Rawayana in Los Angeles before?
B: Yeah, we’ve done a couple of, like, four times, something like that, but smaller venues. We started with a 500 venue, then 700, then a thousand. And now, doing this one, it’s beautiful.
LAT: You’re going to see that it’s a big difference.
B: It’s a big one.
LAT: Are you nervous?
B: No! No, I’m excited.
L: Yeah, I’m with him. [laughs]
B: And I have Li! This has been interesting because we are a duo. I have a front-woman partner, so it’s quite balanced. There are moments that I don’t have to do nothing. I just dance.
L: And enjoy!
B: It’s a balanced show and it’s the first time that I’m singing with someone, because in Rawayana, it’s like backing vocals. It’s not another lead singer, so it’s quite different.
LAT: I love the whole horoscope thing with the album.
L: What sign are you?
LAT: Virgo.
L: Of course you’re Virgo! Of course. I knew it!
B: You can sense it in this five minute conversation.
L: Fofo [Andrés Story] is a Virgo.
B: You look like Fofo ... he’s Rawayana’s drummer.
L: And he produced the album!
B: It was like this. That’s why we called it ASTROPICAL. Because Li was like that, always ‘ah, you’re Virgo! You’re Virgo!’ So I called Li and I told her, ‘Li, this has to be about astrological stuff’ because it was all this, during the process, ‘oh, you’re so Virgo!’
LAT: So each song was written with the intention of being, oh this song is going to be Virgo and this song is going to be …
L: No, we didn’t do that. We did the songs and then after we- it’s funny because we did two big astrological charts and they coincided with each sign being a specific song. It was unplanned! We didn’t start by saying ‘this song will be Capricorn.’ We made the songs, we had them ready and ‘ooh, this one is super Capricorn, this one is very Leo.’ It was very organic.
LAT: Now I want to know what Virgo vibes I gave off.
L: You have glasses! No, just kidding. Your office is probably very organized. You really are clean, like obsessive. You’re really good at what you do! A studious nerd.
LAT: I’m also a college professor. [laughs]
L: My goodness, so Virgo. So Virgo! Not Beto or me. We are Capricorn and Aquarius.
LAT: For this tour, is it just the two of you and everyone else from Rawayana and Bomba are on vacation.
L: No, it’s me and Beto on the stage. Fofo on the drums, Orestes [Gomez], who plays sometimes with them sometimes, and José [Castillo] from Bomba. It’s a fusion.
B: They play everything. Orestes is a drummer but also a percussionist but also plays samples. Fofo plays bass and guitar and José also plays piano and guitar. They are always changing. And us two singing.
It’s very interesting because you can feel the blend. For example, Jose has this amazing branded sound in the guitar that is there that is very Bomba. That’s very interesting. You can feel the blend.
And the other two Rawayanas are home and the other musicians of Bomba, they are home too. They are watching everything.
LAT: I was going to say, too, when I heard the album, it sounds completely original. I never thought, okay, this part sounds very Bomba, this part sounds very Rawayana. It was all ASTROPICAL.
B: Yeah, because the whole process was, like, first we started with different producers. There’s IzyBeats, that has this afrobeat personality and then blended with Fofo’s style and with Jose’s and with Lil [Einyel], we just started doing stuff [and] collaborating with different producers. For example, ‘Me Pasa” is a beat from Angel from Venezuela ... that lives in Caracas, and then we put the personality in.
The interesting thing is that we didn’t start it like, ‘let’s do this Bomba sound or that sound.' We did it, like, 'let’s put our songwriting skills into this beat from these amazing people and then let’s put the accents. Let’s put this guitar, let’s put this like this.' Then Li has some songs under the Bomba folder and we have different songs too that we thought could fit cool with the project and we ended up doing that too.
L: Actually, too, when you hear the lyrics, we’re different songwriters. Beto is more, like, he’ll make jokes and a little more spicy ... and I’m more romantic and spiritual and more, like, ‘I’m not going to say that!’ I take some things and I do some spicy things too.
A long time ago, I used to be more coqueta and sexual vibes, but I think, right now, it’s more different and I talk more about other things, but on this album, I do some stuff like that. It was fun because we really have different styles and, at the same time, we’re from similar places and similar cultures.
LAT: How has the tour been so far?
L: Fun! It’s crazy. We are in crazy moments in our lives right now, Beto and me and everybody. It’s crazy but we have so much fun on the stage, which is one of the most important things to share with the people. At the same time, we don’t take it too seriously.
We, of course, really care about it ... [but] we thought of this project like a one-year project, so we’re relaxed. We thought ‘okay, we’re going to do this tour and we’re gonna finish and whatever happens is okay.’ But we thought of this project as a one-year project. We thought it was more interesting because people can see it once and that’s it. We’ll see what happens later. But when it’s like a one-year project, you can relax a little bit.
LAT: There’s no expectation of needing to do something else after this tour is over.
L: No. None.
B: We were in Santa Marta writing songs at Li’s house and nearby Li’s house, there was a karaoke night. We did a couple of karaoke nights. We were singing karaoke and it was very fun. We didn’t talk too much about this, but the show is quite fun because of us sowing that process, in a way. The process was like that: us making these songs and also singing karaoke, so this show is quite like us singing our favorite Bomba songs and our favorite Rawayana songs, the ASTROPICAL songs, but also we have the freedom to play songs that we like since we were kids.
The whole energy on the stage is how the process was and, for me, it feels easy to sing Bomba songs because it feels like a karaoke and also we are singing some covers. It’s a very fun show for us. The process was like that: we were singing covers and writing these songs.
LAT: Is there anything you want to tease about Sunday’s show? Any surprises?
L: Like when Bad Bunny comes out on stage? Naaaaah. No, the good thing is that every show is different, so there are surprises even for us. It’s very fun to do it, but as far as the tour, we don’t have any surprises. We are so boring!
B: I feel like people have to be ready to dance.
L: We’re going to give away Beto’s boxers on the last day of the tour.
LAT: [laughs] Will they be autographed?
B: No, I don’t think that would be too sexy. It sounds horrible.
L: No, women love that kind of stuff.
B: The ladies are plenty crazy. TikTok women are very horny.
LAT: [laughs] Do you get requests all the time from women?
B: No, it’s the way they express themselves on it. It’s very funny.
L: I have no opinion on the matter. [laughs] But I want to say something that is really important: I just listened to something the day before yesterday from an artist that I really like, Jacob Collier. It was in Colombia when he said ‘we don’t need good musicians, we need good people.’ So, we need good people and musicians just have to be unique and be true to themselves. Not the best, not perfect, but simply be who they are so that music can continue to create the impact it engenders.
LAT: Wow, that’s beautiful. That’s much better than ‘music is politics!’
L: Beyond politics! It’s an important word: beyond!
ASTROPICAL headline the Hollywood Bowl this Sunday, September 7 with opening acts Macario Martínez and Yendry.
