You guys are kicking off your West Coast tour with your first-ever show in Las Vegas. How do you think your funky Latin dance tunes will go over here?
We’ve heard that there’s not that much, like, deep dance stuff there; it’s more touristy stuff. But most of the time in that kind of city, with a lot of tourists, there’s a really interesting underground scene going on, because the people that live there are interested in something different than the tourists. We’ve been going to Tijuana for a while, and that’s always been seen as a touristy place. But our experiences there have always been amazing. The people that live there are into really interesting stuff. So we’re really excited about playing Las Vegas for Las Vegas people.
Your music melds sounds from so many different genres. Since you’re the band’s principal songwriter, I’m curious what you grew up listening to.
We grew up hearing all the Caribbean rhythms—salsa, meringue, bolero, mambo—but Venezuela was also a very rich country in the ’70s, so a lot of Anglo artists came to play there, like Kool & The Gang, K.C. and the Sunshine Band and the Jacksons. And we also had a huge heritage from Spain and Italy following all the European immigration in the ’60s. So all that is our pop culture in Venezuela, and because of that we try to write and play very cosmopolitan stuff.
Since Los Amigos’ last disc was a collection of Venezuelan pop covers, it’s been almost five years since you released an album of original music. Are you itching to get some new tunes out there?
Exactly. That Venezuelan pop record was meant to be an EP—every member was gonna chose one song from the ’70s and ’80s—and then it became an album. So that delayed our own material for a while, and we’re becoming desperate to put an album out of our own stuff. We’re planning to put something out on April 1.
With Si*Sé. February 7, 8:30 p.m., $20. House of Blues, 632-7600.