Ranil (Peru)

Raúl Llerena aka Ranil is one of the last still active heroes of the heyday of chicha in the 1970s, and his native city, Iquitos, marks precisely the spot where this music emerged.

In the Amazon region on the border between Brazil and Colombia, cumbia and Afro-Brazilian rhythms, indigenous folklore, and American rock, psychedelia, and above all surf music blended to form a style of music named after a kind of beer: chicha, fermented corn juice, has been drunk since the Inca period. Ranil has released more than a dozen chicha albums in a very “indie” way, having broken early on with the execs and mafia of the recording industry to form his own production company. Today he is primarily active as a politically committed radio moderator but also as one of the last protagonists of the original chicha sound.