LAS ROBERTAS

Published on July 11th, 2016

LAS ROBERTAS

While forged in America (and arguably perfected in England), rock ‘n’ roll is international property — now more than ever. With the assistance of the internet, artists from around the world are making a stateside splash in 2016 more and more often, and Las Robertas is the band carrying the flag for Costa Rica, and the South American purveyors of shoegaze-informed garage-rock appear to be truly hitting their stride this year.

With the release of teaser single “The Feel” from the impending Waves of the New, Las Robertas has flexed a sound that is darker and more mature and expanded than past efforts, but retains the catchiness that earned the group its buzz. When asked about this sonic evolution, Las Robertas’ frontwoman Mercedes Oller told PureHoney “We’ve grown up a little and shed some of the influences that had been present in our sound before” elaborating that “like any band that’s been at it for awhile, we were kind of sick of writing and playing the same style of songs over and over again, too. The essence of what we are remains, but the changes on this record are big.”

On being torchbearers for Costa Rica’s rock scene, Oller explained “In the past couple of years, Costa Rica has become a real hub for the alternative latin music scene, along with Mexico, Chile, and Argentina. However, when it comes to the specific type of rock music that we play, there aren’t many bands in our vein. There are a lot of bands that we like (Ave Negra, Colornoise, Monte, Los Waldners, Desorden Siniestro), but we never had that much support from our local scene. We always had to go to places like Mexico, which is like our second home. Also, there aren’t a lot of venues to play in Costa Rica, so you get a bit bored playing the same ones, but the younger kids and newcomers to the scene have been changing it a lot in a positive way lately, and we’re super happy about that.” Oller also told PureHoney the band is “very excited to play South Florida! We think that Florida is like going through a hype phase right now! Everyone likes to play there!”