Rubén Guevara and The Eastside Luvers
The Tao of Funkahuatl
The Tao of Funkahuatl
by Vicente Mercado
Rubén Guevara and The Eastside Luvers’ The Tao of Funkahuatl is a highly personal and long overdue album that borderlines on a masterpiece. A man of multiple talents who has gone through several incarnations in his long career, Guevara put together The Eastside Luvers, a top notch band of veteran musicians to helpe him create an original musical blend of subtle funk, blues, jazz, rhythm and blues, spoken word, Mex-Americana, and good old time rock ‘n’ roll. Produced by Guevara and John Avila, engineered and mixed by Avila, of the El Chicano, Food for Feet, and Oingo Boingo fame. The first half of the album was entirely written by Ruben Guevara. For the flip side Guevara wrote the lyrics and was joined by the whole band in composing the music. Minimalist is a word that can be used to describe the album’s overall bare bones sound. The four instruments mostly lay a thick solid funk and jazz foundation for Guevara’s poetic singing or spoken word.
Presently, The Tao of Funkahuatl is limited to 100 vinyl copies with a signed art print by artist John Valadez. The release bridges many things: Chicano music and Chicano art; East and West; sexuality and spirituality; youth and wisdom; yesteryear’s music format, vinyl, and today’s downloads. (A download link is included with each album.)
A couple of decades ago Rubén Guevara created and adopted a new persona, Funkahuatl -the Aztec god of funk based on a character from a solo performance art piece. In The Tao of Funkahuatl he sings, defines, discloses, and explains his new outlook on life and philosophy: mature love, sensuality, sexuality and spirituality as a senior soul man, reflecting on his personal life, Tibetan Buddhism, the beauty of the duality of Chicano life, and Pachuquismo. Like many thinkers, shamans, visionaries, and Chicano philosophers who have tried to intellectualize the idea of being a pachuco, The Tao of Funkahuatl takes a stab at it, and borrows professor/poet Alurista’s, definition, “Being a pachuco is living your life as a work of art.” This concept became a principal tenet in The Tao of Funkahuatl.
Rubén Guevara was born into show business. His father was part of a Mexican trio who came to Los Angeles in the late 1930s to represent Mexico in an international folk music festival at the LA Memorial Coliseum. The group included one of Mexican ranchero music’s main icons Miguel Aceves Mejia. The group, Los Porteños, found steady work doing live radio, movie soundtracks, and concerts and refused to follow Aceves Mejia back to Mexico. Guevara’s mother, Sarita Vara, met Rubén senior back stage at the Million Dollar Theatre after a performance. She convinced his dad to stay and pursue his career in LA. She later became an actress who performed with leading Hollywood movie stars such as Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, and Jack Palance.
Presently, The Tao of Funkahuatl is limited to 100 vinyl copies with a signed art print by artist John Valadez. The release bridges many things: Chicano music and Chicano art; East and West; sexuality and spirituality; youth and wisdom; yesteryear’s music format, vinyl, and today’s downloads. (A download link is included with each album.)
A couple of decades ago Rubén Guevara created and adopted a new persona, Funkahuatl -the Aztec god of funk based on a character from a solo performance art piece. In The Tao of Funkahuatl he sings, defines, discloses, and explains his new outlook on life and philosophy: mature love, sensuality, sexuality and spirituality as a senior soul man, reflecting on his personal life, Tibetan Buddhism, the beauty of the duality of Chicano life, and Pachuquismo. Like many thinkers, shamans, visionaries, and Chicano philosophers who have tried to intellectualize the idea of being a pachuco, The Tao of Funkahuatl takes a stab at it, and borrows professor/poet Alurista’s, definition, “Being a pachuco is living your life as a work of art.” This concept became a principal tenet in The Tao of Funkahuatl.
Rubén Guevara was born into show business. His father was part of a Mexican trio who came to Los Angeles in the late 1930s to represent Mexico in an international folk music festival at the LA Memorial Coliseum. The group included one of Mexican ranchero music’s main icons Miguel Aceves Mejia. The group, Los Porteños, found steady work doing live radio, movie soundtracks, and concerts and refused to follow Aceves Mejia back to Mexico. Guevara’s mother, Sarita Vara, met Rubén senior back stage at the Million Dollar Theatre after a performance. She convinced his dad to stay and pursue his career in LA. She later became an actress who performed with leading Hollywood movie stars such as Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, and Jack Palance.
Guevara was born in Boyle Heights but lived all over L. A. due to the family constantly moving because of his dad’s touring. He finally moved to Boyle Heights in the early eighties, then later worked on the movie Born in East L. A. as an actor and music producer/coordinator. He was credited on screen as the flick’s East L. A.’s cultural attache. Since then he has been a proud resident and cultural activist in the area, becoming, as the LA Times put it, “Cultural godfather of Boyle Heights,” which is the principal setting for The Tao of Funkahuatl.
Guevara began his musical career as part of the doo wop duo The Apollo Brothers, (the duo’s name was misspelled by the printer, reading Appollo with two Ps), ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5mHSVWdrMs ). He did one national TV music appearance on Shindig! in his early 20s along with Tina Turner and Bo Diddley.
