By José Gandue @Gandour
More than just a promotional video for one of their songs, the Bogota-based group The Ethnic Group presents in his clip Items their product catalog (records, clothing, spray paint cans and other pieces of their merchandise), with one of their most recent recordings playing in the background. It's a commercial, an advertisement, that's clear. Should that offend us in any way? I don't think so.
Etnnia has demonstrated in its more than 20 years of history that in music, and especially in hip hop, It's about seizing every opportunity and making the most of it, or else you die quickly.. Nobody before, two decades ago, nor now, in the age of digital platforms and the lukewarm return of vinyl, invests their money in a Colombian hip-hop project, unless it's the artists themselves, the ones who are truly affected, those forced to figure out how to make things work. The Pimienta brothers understood this early on. And that's why they launched their own label, 5-27 Records., And as time has gone on, they've created new divisions of the business. They've done well; they've reached this point. Why, after all this time, an era full of promotional hype and bands sold to the highest bidder, Wasn't La Etnnia going to remind people of their history, being the only truly independent project that has survived and grown in Bogotá all this time?
The ethnicity thing is not ostentation, not at all., It is irrefutable proof of the value of perseverance.
