Rising London-based instrumental outfit Los Bitchos — Australian-born, London-based Serra Petale (guitar); Uruguayan-born, London-based Agustina Ruiz (keytar); Swedish-born, London-based Josefine Jonsson (bass) and London-born and-based Nic Crawshaw (drums) — can trace their origins to meeting at various late-night parties and through mutual friends. The rising British-based band also features individual members with different upbringings, who have developed a unique, retro-futuristic sound that blends elements of Peruvian chicha, Argentine cumbia, Turkish psych and surf rock, as well the music each individual member grew up with:

• The Uruguayan-born Ruiz had a Latin-American music collection that the members of the band fell in love with.
• The Swedish-born Jonsson “brings a touch of out of control pop,” her bandmates often joke.
• Aussie-born Serra Petale is deeply inspired by her mother’s 70s Anatolian rock records.
• And the London-born Crawshaw played in a number of local punk bands before joining Los Bitchos.

“Coming from all these different places,” Los Bitchos’ Serra Petale says, “it means we’re not stuck in one genre and we can rip up the rulebook a bit when it comes to our influences.”

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past handful of months, you might recall that Los Bitchos’ highly anticipated Alex Kapranos-produced full-length debut,  Let The Festivities Begin! officially dropped today. Recorded at Gallery Studios, Let The Festivities Begin! sees the London-based instrumental outfit further establishing their reputation for crafting maximalist and trippy, Technicolor, instrumental party starting jams — with a cinematic quality. 

The album’s celebratory title is something you might say while toasting dear friends, families and even strangers at a gathering — and hopefully at the of this horrible period of despair and uncertainty, as a way to usher in a period of carefree debauchery. “It’s about being together and having a really good time,” Los Bitchos say in press notes.

In the lead-up to Let The Festivities Begin!‘s I’ve managed to write about three of the album’s singles:

• “Las Panteras” a funky, mind-bending jam featuring shimmering synths bongos, cowbell, cabasa and wiry post punk meets Nile Rodgers and surf rock-like guitars and a sinuous bass line. 
• “Good to Go,” another mind-bending, genre-blurring composition that begins with a decidedly Western intro with shimmering and reverb-drenched guitar twang before quickly morphing into a a trippy yet chilled out Latin funk meets Turkish psych affair with glistening synths, handclaps and a blazing guitar solo. 
• “Pista (Fresh Start),” a slick and trippy synthesis of chicha, cumbia and psych rock featuring looping guitars and dance floor friendly Latin rhythms.

To celebrate the release of their debut album, the rising British quartet shared Let The Festivities Begin!‘s fourth and latest single, “The Link Is About to Die,” which continues a run of trippy, party friendly grooves centered around glistening and looping guitar lines, twinkling synths and shuffling polyrhythm.

The recently released digitally animated, video game-inspired visual for “The Link Is About to Die” was completed over the course of a “4-day visual/video jam” between creators Adam Abdelkader Lenox, Julie Amouzegar Kim, Alexander Turovsky, Jan Rosenbauer, Pamier Hilal and Severin Most. The video features Animal Crossing-like video game avatars of the band getting sucked into a dark universe, where they have to battle a “sexy fish” creature. They celebrate their victory over the sexy fish, by drinking some mind-bending tequila and playing their instruments on the back of an enormous bird. The video is a hilariously bizarre and playful romp through space, time — and video game baddies.