Juaneco Y Su Combo

The saga surrounding Juaneco y Su Combo could supply material for any Behind the Music episode, encompassing psychedelic substances, expeditions deep into the rainforest, struggles amid impoverished urban districts, a deadly aviation disaster, and nonstop rock & roll energy. During their peak period in the early 1970s, the group ranked among Peru’s most inventive chicha ensembles. Chicha itself emerged abruptly from the cultural collisions of the late 1960s, when Amazonian Indigenous communities first encountered Colombian cumbia alongside American rock & roll. Once petroleum reserves were located in the jungle, oil firms moved in, introducing limited infrastructure and wages that supplied local residents with modest spending power. Affordable electric instruments soon appeared, enabling Amazonian players to assemble dance ensembles whose melodies drew on Andean traditions while riding the offbeat pulse of cumbia—a relaxed Latin counterpart to ska—through heavily processed electric guitars and Tex-Mex-style Farfisa organs.

Juan Wong Paredes, a saxophonist of Chinese descent who manufactured bricks during daylight hours and performed music after dark, formed the original lineup in the Shipibo-dominated Amazonian settlement of Pucallpa to explore jazz and dance repertoire. His son, Juan Wong Popolizio, later assumed direction of the group, switching from accordion to Farfisa. The remaining musicians, already exposed to surf recordings and spaghetti-Western soundtracks via cassettes brought by oil workers, could also tune into Colombian cumbia and Brazilian carimbo broadcasts; they fused these imported styles with Shipibo ceremonial music. Popolizio recruited guitarist Noé “El Brujo” Fachin, whose distinctive fingerpicking approach translated criollo (Afro-Peruvian) repertoire onto electric guitar. Fachin had recently acquired a wah-wah pedal and deployed it extensively.

Fachin emerged as both a prolific composer and an exceptional guitarist, crafting pieces that wove cumbia, carimbo, Afro-Peruvian elements, huayño, psychedelic rock, reggae, and additional influences into the unruly template that defined chicha. He was equally skilled with ayahuasca, the vine-derived psychedelic, and his lyrics merged Indigenous narratives, forest lore, and personal visionary experiences; he later remarked that his strongest material arrived during ayahuasca sessions. The musicians adopted Shipibo traditional attire, a choice that proved useful once the band relocated to Lima.

Following their 1970 arrival in the capital, Juaneco y Su Combo spearheaded the Ola Amazonica movement. Their debut success on the short-lived INFOPESA label was “Mujer Hilandera,” a cumbia adaptation of the Brazilian song “Mulher Reindeira” previously recorded by Joan Baez. That single’s popularity generated multiple albums, among them El Gran Cacique (1970, INFOPESA; 2008, Barbès). The resulting acclaim established the group as chicha’s foremost act, prompting tours across Peru, Brazil, Ecuador, and Colombia. Label owner and producer Alberto Maravi oversaw three additional releases. The ensemble’s propulsive Farfisa lines, exploratory psychedelic guitar work, driving rhythms, and Indigenous costumes drew large crowds in Lima, even while middle- and upper-class audiences dismissed chicha for its “street vibe.” Their breakthrough cleared paths for subsequent ensembles such as Los Mirlos, Los Hijos del Sola, Los Destellos, Los Diablos Rojos, and Eusebio y Su Banjo, yet Juaneco y Su Combo continued to set the pace.

After a Labor Day engagement on May 2, 1977, most members boarded a small private aircraft bound for Pucallpa; the plane crashed, claiming the lives of Noé Fachin, Walter Dominguez, Ediberto Vasquez, Jairo Aguilar, and Wilfredo Murrieta. Survivors Juan Wong Paredes, singer Wilindoro Cacique, timbalero Rosendo Hidalgo, and conguero Juvencio Pinchi completed the band’s final album and recruited five new musicians. Without Fachin the group never recovered its former sharpness, although it retained a Peruvian following. Juaneco passed away in 2004, after which his son, Mao Wong Lopez, assumed leadership. The story might have concluded there, yet in 2007 Oliver Conan, proprietor of Brooklyn’s Barbès nightclub and record label, encountered the music during a Peruvian visit. He assembled the U.S.-targeted compilation Roots of Chicha: Psychedelic Cumbias from Peru (2007, Barbès), prompting world-music listeners to embrace the sound—already four decades old. Juaneco y Su Combo emerged from obscurity and began appearing alongside younger rock acts in Barranco’s trendiest clubs, where their retro approach earned admiration. Multiple Peruvian television documentaries and profiles in leading magazines have since chronicled the band; at the close of 2008 the group was preparing for its inaugural U.S. tour. ~ j. poet