MONTONEROS

Checkit! Denver's Montoneros are a bilingual band of buds who probably like Illegal Pete's, snowboarding, and the other kind of buds. 

...Actually, we are making dumb assumptions based on the fact that they live in Denver. We have no idea if they like any of those things. ...But c'mon. They're from Denver, so they probably do. Then again, people think Montanans are beer-swilling horse-riding boot-wearing chaw-chewing ranchers, so who knows... Maybe we'll find out when we read about them:

Montoneros: a band of look-alikes.
(l-r) Joey Cape, Will Forte,
Mark Arm with his hair cut off, Mark Arm without his hair cut off

Montoneros! Hi and thanks for agreeing to do the interview. Who are you, what instrument do you play in the band, and what was your favorite tv show growing up?

Oh hello! This is Gastón, I play guitar and sing and whistle and provide occasional ‘woos’. I can say without a doubt that from age 7 on, The Simpsons had as much influence in shaping my world view as my parents did. Sorry mom ;(

You classify yourselves as a bilingual band. Are you all from the U.S.? Did you grow up speaking a non-English language? Is there a particular reason you decided to write some of your lyrics in English and others in (what I assume is) Spanish?

All of the Montoneros are native Coloradans except for me - I was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina and moved to the US at 3, but I didn’t really learn to speak English until around age 6 and then I attended a bilingual school through 7th grade which helped me maintain my Spanish. To be honest, writing in Spanish is nice because most audiences in our scene have no idea what I am saying (not even the rest of my band hah), and that takes some pressure off of me because my lyrics r dum sumtimes.

Also, I think there is something neat about hearing music in a foreign language – since you can’t derive meaning from the lyrics, you are pushed to focus on the melodies and vocal patterns.

A Mexican friend laughed when he saw your name...he told me it translates to "gangbangers". Is that so?

Ha! I guess we unwittingly chose the thug life…

That translation is news to me, but it seems ‘montoneros’ holds different meanings in different countries.

We took the name from the Argentina leftist group of the 1970s/80s. They fought against a military coup that had overthrown a democratically elected government. Incidentally, my grandfather was part of that military coup – he raided Juan D. Peron’s (the overthrown president) home, and was subsequently “elected” as the mayor of Cordoba, the second largest city in Argentina at the time. Basically – he did lots of super lame stuff that I disagree with wholeheartedly, and feel guilty about being associated with that shitty legacy.

We are by no means a political band; I just thought that naming the band ‘Montoneros’ would be a solid way to piss off my gramps. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Overall, you would prefer: a.) A hotter climate with mild winters b.) A colder climate with mild summers c.) A middle-ground climate, but no noticeable change of seasons

My ideal climate involves minimal use of pants, so I’d have to say middle ground climate year-round leaning towards the spicy end of the thermostat.

Are you a lover or a fighter?

Definitely a lover, but mostly by default - I’ve never punched anyone in the face and the prospect of doing so makes me anxious.

What activities are you interested in aside from band stuff?

-Our drummer Brandon is attempting to pump out enough children to be the first Iditarod champion to win with a sled pulled by their own offspring (he’s up to two kids so far). The rest of us are big Pog enthusiasts - in fact back in March, we created the first annual Pog Convention, aka Pog-Con 2015. To be honest, it was just the four of us in our underwear drunkenly throwing slammers through the drywall at our practice space. But still – we’ll cherish those memories forever.

Outside of our pog passion, I work in software & music promotion, Jeremy’s a badass graphic designer and Logan is a sexy handyman.

What would you say makes your band tick?

I’d say the fact that we are great friends with similar influences and aspirations – hopefully that translates to something neat when we play live!

Will this be your first time to MT as a band? And are you going anywhere else when you head this direction?

This will be our inaugural Montana visit! And it’s just a little weekend trip for us because tours are expensive and I guess we have jobs that we should probably keep (for now).

Please direct us to where we can hear your songs and find out more about you:

-Welp I’m a dummy and misspelled our FB page URL when I set it up, so you have to go to www.facebook.com/montanerosmusic to “Like” us if that’s your thing. Otherwise you can get our new single at our bandcamp page for a mean .53 cents:

https://montoneros.bandcamp.com/

Aw man... We totally forgot to ask them about their snowsports, smoking habits, and love of fast-casual wrapped food. Oh well...We'll talk later; for now, I gotta go buy some Skoal and wrestle a calf.

p.s. More product placement! C'mon corporate tobacco, show us the money!

SEE YOU AT DREYFEST!