Cumbia villera

Cumbia villera (locally: [ˈkumbja βiˈʒeɾa] or [ˈkumbja βiˈʃeɾa]) (roughly translated as "slum cumbia", "ghetto cumbia" or "shantytown cumbia") is a subgenre of cumbia music originated in the slums of Argentina and popularized all over Latin America and the Latin communities abroad.

Lyrically, cumbia villera uses the vocabulary of the marginal and lower classes, like the Argentine lunfardo and lenguaje tumbero («gangsta language» or «thug language»), and deals with themes such as the everyday life in the villas miseria (slums), poverty and misery, the use of hard drugs, promiscuity and/or prostitution, night outs at boliches (discos and clubs) that play cumbia and other tropical music genres (such as the emblematic Tropitango venue in Pacheco), the football culture of the barra bravas, delincuency and clashes with the police and other forms of authority, antipathy towards politicians, authenticity as of being true villeros (the inhabitants of the villas), among other topics dealt in cumbia villera's lyrics.

Musically, cumbia villera bases its sound in a heavy use of synthesizers, sound effects, keyboard voices, keytars, electronic drums and other elements from electric instruments. The cumbia villera's characteristic sound was born taking influences from cumbia colombiana, cumbia sonidera, cumbia santafesina, and cumbia chicha in the realm of cumbia, and from reggae, ska, Argentine folklore, and electronic music in other music genres. Lastly, the creator of cumbia villera, Pablo Lescano, admitted that his lyrics were influenced by bands from Argentine punk rock like 2 Minutos and Argentine rock rolinga like Viejas Locas. This overview is not definitive, as time went on and the genre evolved, many bands started to explore different sounds, so new fusions were born, like cumbia rapera with Bajo Palabra («Parole») mixing cumbia villera with hip hop, and tropipunk with Kumbia Queers mixing cumbia villera with punk.

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