LOS ANGELES (Top40 Charts/ ER:M+M) CALONCHO is an artist from the North state of Sonora and an adoptive son of Guadalajara where he has been living for most of his life and where his first musical incursions have generated reactions that have marked his young career. He has been recently nominated for 2 Latin Grammy Awards as "Best New Artist" and "Best Alternative
Music Album" with his EP called "Fruta" [Fruit], produced by Siddhartha, a great artist who was attracted to CALONCHO by his amazing musical sensitivity.
Oscar Castro, known as CALONCHO since childhood, has also received numerous positive reviews for his first EP, and 2 awards out of his 4 nominations for the Indi-O
Music Awards (IMAS) that reward the best independent music in Mexico: the "Best Pop Album" and "Best Solo Album" awards. The EP "Fruta" was among the most-sold albums on iTunes in Mexico for 5 consecutive months, and the tracks "Palmar" and "Chupetazos" remained among the 50 most-virally-searched songs on Spotify.
"Fruta" was released in
September 2013. "It sounds like everything I have been listening to and filtered during my upbringing, covering from Mexican folk songs, the beach, a little bit of the forest and the city, to learning situations, existence, longing and love of life," states CALONCHO, an artist who grew up surrounded by music. Even though initially a drum set was his first instrument of choice, he later showed a preference for the guitar which was the instrument of the first songs he wrote. "My dad would write songs for us as if making 'hard-boiled eggs', and I am sure that that was my poetical inspiration for creating situations, combined with my mother's impeccable vocabulary and verbal abilities."
That is how CALONCHO, starting at a very early age, began to manufacture songs and to mold them as if they were play dough, until he shaped "Fruta". This is an album where he used organic sounds and objects not considered to be musical instruments, such as water, fruit, seeds and lighters, among others. This record reflects a very positive and happy stage where he sings about love, depicting situations and experiences of his own life.
While Rolling Stone magazine in Mexico reviewed "Fruta" as one of the best Latin albums of 2013, the radio station Ibero 90.9 praised is as one of the 9 best EPs of the year. The track "Palmar" positioned itself at #14 on the list of 10 best singles of the year, according to Warp magazine, and in the United States that same song made its debut on "Today's Top Tune" at KCRW, a radio station that has a significant influence on new musical trends.
Very few albums manage to attract the attention "Fruta" has earned during the last few months. This is an EP with songs that take us from the depths of the sea to the warm and burning sun, peppered with excellent melodies. An outstanding first product by this young artist who has a very promising future.
