Chalino created a whole new genre of Nortena music termed narcocorridos, which was equivalent to gangster rap. Songs were based on Mexican cartels, drug smuggling, police corruption sung to polka beats laced with an accordion line. Chalino’s career was cut short; he was murdered in Culiacan Sinaloa at the age of 31. His unsolved death added to the Chalino mystic, soon everyone was bumping Chalino songs out of their car stereos. The controversy surrounding his death made Chalino a modern day folk hero. What Tupac was to rap world, Chalino was to Nortenas.

It was only a matter of time before working-class Mexican-Americans would rediscover their parents’ folk music with a modern day gangster twist. Soon sporting Tony Lama boots, Stetson cowboy hats (the more x’s the better), and silk shirts became the rage in barrios and vaquero clubs through out the southwest.

Darkroom Familia became the first rap group to intertwine these two worlds into one album called “Matan Mi Gente”. Sir Dyno and Drew created their narco alter egos Locote and Tokztero to form Los Traficantes. Instead of rapping over polka beats, they switched it up with some of the phat bay area bass production with the traditional accordion to compliment their lyrics. The subject matter is basically the same, drug smuggling “Dos Traficantes”, corruption “Corrupcion”, and a story about a dead homie “Mi Camarada”. Mixing Spanish narco slang such as “cuerno de chivo” (AK-47) with references to narco classics like Los Tucanes de Tijuana’s “Mis 3 Animals” works well together. This is great album for those that grew up on gangster rap and corridos, giving you the best of both worlds.

Give credit where credit is due, Darkroom Familia bought something new to the table. You never know, this might be the start of a new trend of combining traditional Mexican music with Latin rap.