Nobody can - Like a Mexi Can | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: Nobody can - Like a Mexi Can | Previous Challenge Entry
By Noel Mitaxa
08/18/21
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In trying to throw light on where we are and where we’re from, historians focus on the passing parade of political figures and their influence, which can often disguise the length and depth of cultural legacies - from musicians, poets, and philosophers. I know this sounds like we could be in for heavy reading, but a punchline awaits you…

The British Empire’s influence has waned, despite Beatlemania’s brief rule in the teenage world of the sixties. But literary giants like William Shakespeare and John Locke – “the father of Liberalism” – from centuries past will be with us for centuries to come.

Ancient Greek philosophers, poets and mathematicians still resonate through today’s academia, and Olympic Games invoke the ancient sports festivals at Mount Olympus. But as for music, I’m afraid that Zorba’s Dance is the only Greek contribution that comes to mind.

Our world still carries serious scars from how Nazism’s malevolence festered and spread into World War Two. But Hitler is gone, unmourned and overlooked, in the array of German influences on our culture. Consider the literature of Goethe; the Reformation that Luther pioneered; and how concert halls are still packed for Beethoven’s music, two centuries after his death.

Communism took root in Russia in 1917 and suppressed Eastern Europe for fifty years until the nineties. Yet Tchaikovsky’s music matches Beethoven’s popularity, and two centuries after Tolstoy and Dostoevsky first drew breath, their novels still stir our emotions with their insights into life’s struggles.

But wait, what about the Mexicans that we started with?

Thanks for asking; for their influence has been subtle but strong – even reaching across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Sixties’ pop culture and music will show this, through a small amount of actual history and a much larger amount of my carelessly contrived and totally unreliable research…

Archie comics became popular in the fifties and sixties as we followed his episodes with teenage friends Jughead, Betty, Veronica and Reggie. But the big question had a subtle Mexican flavour - would Betty or Veronica be the one who would eventually tie the knot, and “mariachi?”

Around that time, one of Australia’s biggest bands was Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs – another subtle ancient Mexican contribution. And in 1962, British singer Cliff Richard succumbed to this subtlety by releasing a single that began: “Tijuana dance and hold my hand?”

The Mexican cultural invasion climaxed in Tijuana Brass’ huge success, with Herb Alpert on lead trumpet. How about that for upper-body strength – he could hold and play a trumpet made from lead!

I’d always thought they came from Mexico. Yet another disguise, but here I’ll let the truth briefly intrude, for they were all Americans; with Alpert being born in Los Angeles after his Jewish parents had migrated from the Ukraine.

Alpert’s musical dreams were still unfulfilled when he took a trip south to Mexico, where his distinct sound was conceived at a bullfight in Tijuana. He was captured by the emotions of the crowd as they responded to the mariachi band’s trumpet fanfares to introduce each event on the program.

Determined to recapture those emotional triggers in his music, he took the risk of adding the crowd’s surges of excitement to his first record. The risk paid off, for this hit - "The Lonely Bull" – topped the charts around the world

Maintaining their Mexican mariachi band disguise, their hits kept coming; hits like “Tijuana Taxi” and “Spanish Flea.” And throughout, Alpert disguised the fact that he could sing as well as play the trumpet – but not at the same time!

That finishes the historical accuracy, but my sloppy research makes me wonder if he didn’t break this secret open with his only vocal single…

"Disguise in Love with You!"

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