Fuerza Regida gets why the Grammys were slow to find it: ‘It took a while for Mexican music to be cool’
Jesús Ortiz Paz, singer of the San Bernardino-born música Mexicana band Fuerza Regida, is relentless about winning every possible fan. From throwing album-release beach parties to playing gigs at high schools, winging drive-by sets on the 10 Freeway or headlining festivals like Camp Flog Gnaw, the band has done whatever’s necessary to rope young crowds into its expansive vision for corridos tumbados.
Even as the genre exploded on TikTok and streaming over the last few years, and made arena stars out of Fuerza Regida, one audience has escaped the 27-year-old Paz (known colloquially as JOP) thus far — Grammy voters.
Despite its local roots, cross-border superstardom and gargantuan streaming figures (right now it has seven singles with more than 100 million plays on Spotify), the band has yet to be nominated for a Grammy — Latin or otherwise.
“We’re still new in that world,” Paz said in an interview with The Times. The singer was a bit bleary after staying up until 7 a.m. writing music, but he was confident that “we have all the tools it takes to be superstars. I feel like it did take a while for Mexican music to be cool, though. I don’t feel like it’s the Grammys’ fault, because they didn’t know — it just wasn’t as big as it is now.”
That may finally change at next year’s ceremony. Peso Pluma, the superstar of corridos tumbados — hip-hop infused Mexican balladry — took home his first Grammy for regional Mexican music album in 2024. The Recording Academy began to acknowledge the enormous popularity and influence of this scene, one that’s transformed the music of the Americas and beyond.
Fuerza Regida may, finally, be up next for hardware.
Since 2015, Fuerza Regida has been one of the hardest-working acts in música Mexicana. With “Pero No Te Enamores,” the band’s eighth studio album, it’s evolving the genre.
The band is submitting two albums for consideration — 2023’s 30-track mission statement “Pa las Baby’s y Belikeada,” and July’s ambitious club-music experiment “Pero No Te Enamores.” Taken together, they sum up the range of a group that’s hit a rare trifecta: hugely popular, creatively restless and ferociously independent (Fuerza Regida is a leading light of the L.A. label Rancho Humilde).
“Pa las Baby’s” will likely be the entry point for many Grammy voters. Hits like “TQM” and “Sabor Fresa” have become part of the SoCal landscape, with keening horns and neatly interlocked guitar and tololoche lines evoking Mexican tradition, while Paz spins woozy tales of high life decadence at the edge of the underworld. The album (and its quick follow-up, the February EP “Dolido Pero No Arrepentido”) turned them from local heroes and regulars on Billboard’s U.S. regional Mexican charts to stadium-fillers at home and abroad.
One track in particular — “Harley Quinn,” produced with EDM star Marshmello — offered an enticing new path for the group (which also features 12-string guitarist Samuel Jáimez, rhythm guitarist Khrystian Ramos, sousaphonist José “Pelón” García and Moisés López on tololoche). With a new house-music thump behind them, Fuerza Regida found a new after-hours realm.
After weeks of a 40-member-strong writing session in Medellín, Colombia, “Pero No Te Enamores” emerged as a full-on dance music record. The group’s classic instrumentation got a new scaffolding of Jersey club drums, roiling sub-bass and reggaeton thump. It was a big leap, but the band stuck the landing, confident that its connections between música Mexicana and SoCal’s bustling rave scenes were real and vital.
“That was the first time I ever did a camp so far out of my comfort zone,” Paz said. “I wouldn’t have been able to do that alone.”
With club music producers Gordo, Major Lazer and Afrojack on deck, singles like “Nel” and “Secreto Victoria” put their sound in a whole new context — from poolside mezcal reveries to foggy, strobelit nightclubs. To judge by a recent invite-only set at the rave club Avalon Hollywood, it definitely translated.
“I know people have done singles like that, but I don’t think anyone in a group like ours has done that for a whole album,” Paz said. “It was a risk, you know? But it didn’t flop.”
Música Mexicana has been pushed into the mainstream over the last five years by Gen Z and millennial Latino audiences. Here’s a guide on the genre’s essential instruments, where to find the best música Mexicana-themed parties, where to shop for the perfect vaquero outfit and more.
Fuerza Regida has two nights booked at the glimmering new Intuit Dome in Inglewood in November, a firm statement that this band is a defining act of the most important new Latin music phenomenon in years.
As música Mexicana becomes ever-more prominent in American cultural life, Paz is also navigating the cultural nuances of his stardom here and in Mexico, where his band‘s a stadium-filler as well but still a foreigner of a sort.
“I feel really Mexican, but I’m not from Mexico. I speak English and I have a different type of swag, and that makes me connect with people here,” Paz said. “No one takes away the beaner on my face, but they call me ‘The Gringo’ down there. Mexico loves us, but it’s just a little harder for me. I’m not No. 1 over there. I could be one day though, I’ve just gotta work a little harder.”
Right now, Paz is as fervent as ever about expanding Fuerza Regida’s reach in American and Mexican music. That may well include Grammys next year, but it will definitely take the group in even wilder new directions.
“I feel like in five years, we should be a little more mainstream and more and more versatile,” Paz said. “I’d love to do a country song with Luke Combs or Morgan Wallen. I want to do more rap songs too. We want to do everything to keep the genre alive.”
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