Get By With A Little Help From Your Friends: Los Amigos Invisibles Perform Live

Naming your band can be really hard. For instance Megadeath works great as a name for your kick-ass metal band, but not as great if you’re a smooth-jazz trio. So it’s refreshing to find out that the owners of the band name Los Amigos Invisibles are exactly what they say: they are your friends, and they are invisible. Sort of. Their music, a frenetic mix of upbeat Latin rhythms and bass-and-synth driven funk, is the kind of stuff that gets stuck in your head. Long after their CD stops spinning, these invisible friends play on in your mind, and there’s no way to stop them. Street Date played host to Venezuela’s greatest export in our New York studios, where they played cuts off their 2010 worldwide smash hit album Commercial and their new EP Not So Commercial. Click through now to see the video and to meet your new amigos.

“G-String”

Formed in Caracas, Venezuela in the late 1990s Los Amigos Invisibles came together as a band of friends who’d grown weary of that city’s live music scene. Itching for a party soundtrack not limited to salsa or hard-rock (the styles which dominated Caracas clubs at the time) the amigos created a new sound all their own, incorporating the best parts of disco, pop, funk and Latin grooves. The group was an immediate hit and became the city’s go-to party band, quickly revolutionizing the Caracas nightlife with their raucous all-night shows.

“Ease Your Mind”

Los Amigos Invisibles make true the old adage “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Their on-stage chemistry after more than 15 years together is something most bands strive in vain to achieve. But make no mistake, these amigos each have their own distinct personalities and their popularity is due in large part to the charm and playful intelligence of each member. The rhythm section of Juan Manuel Roura (drums) and Mauricio Arcas (congas, percussion) set the pace and keep crowds on their feet, while bass-man José Torres hammers the low notes with a fervor more often found in thrash metal bands. The over-the-top (and typically shirtless) stage antics of Armando Figueredo provide brief distraction from the onslaught of disco sounds emanating from his keyboards-and-synths rig. Guitar-god José “DJ Afro” Pardo is in a class all his own, teaching a virtual history of rock ‘n roll through his six strings while tossing well-timed vocoder vocals into the mix.

Leading the charge is one of the most charismatic frontmen in the business, the incurable jokester Julio “Chulius” Briceño. Rarely will you find a singer so in tune with his audience that he seems to maintain eye contact with everyone in the crowd, at all times. If the band is there to set up the audience with dance-able rhythms and driving baselines, Briceño is there to bring ‘em home with his teasing glances and the songs’ sexy subject matter. A Los Amigos Invisibles show isn’t something you watch, it’s an experience you participate in – sweating it out with the band well past the point where you thought you’d drop.

“Sueno Erotico”

The four walls of the Street Date studios barely held things together when the band stopped by for their performance session. Hit play on the videos and watch as they deliver constrained, but revealing, versions of some of their great recent tunes. The set draws heavily from their 2010 album Commercial (“In Love With You,” “Sueno Erotico” and “Ease Your Mind”) but also includes a brand-new track “G-String” from their 2011 EP Not So Commericial. Both albums are available for sale at iTunes and on the band’s website.

“In Love With You”

The band left Venezuela in the early 2000s, bound first for San Francisco and eventually New York City, on a quest to expand their horizons beyond the Caracas party scene they’d created. The people and musicians they encountered first in California and the East Coast greatly influenced the two albums which are considered their masterworks: 2000′s Arepa 3000: A Venezuelan Journey Into Space and 2003′s The Venezuelan Zinga Son, Vol. 1. Hit play on the interview video below to hear the story of their move to the U.S., and get insight into their drive to achieve mainstream success with the release of the aptly-titled Commercial.

Los Amigos Invisibles Interview