{"id":359832,"date":"2026-07-03T11:09:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T11:09:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359832\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T11:09:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T11:09:23","slug":"pride-music-and-community-houston-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359832\/","title":{"rendered":"Pride, Music and Community – Houston Press"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the\u00a0third\u00a0time, Chicano Boulevard will host the\u00a0H-Town Raza Takeover at Dan Electro\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0on July 4,\u00a0celebrating\u00a0Houston\u2019s long-standing and powerful Chicano music community. <\/p>\n

Chicano Boulevard, founded by Isaac Rodriguez, also known as DJ Mr. Simmer Down, has been honoring his vision of celebrating and preserving Houston\u2019s Chicano history and culture.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

He will be on site spinning\u00a0the best in brown-eyed\u00a0soul highlighting Houston\u2019s\u00a0significant Chicano contributions to R&B and soul music of the \u201860s and \u201970s.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The evening will also feature performances\u00a0by the rocking duo, St. Judas and The Black Hymns as well as longtime Houston favorites The Flamin\u2019 Hellcats. \u00a0The\u00a0evening closes out\u00a0with\u00a0the\u00a0incomparable Los\u00a0Skarnales<\/a>\u00a0before they fly overseas to perform at\u00a0Sjock\u00a0Festival<\/a> in Belgium.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Los\u00a0Skarnales\u00a0founder Felipe Galvan has always\u00a0championed\u00a0pride in his\u00a0Mexican roots and a desire to help\u00a0represent\u00a0and push forward other \u201craza\u201d artists.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cStarting at Fitzgerald\u2019s whenever we had the privilege to\u00a0pick and choose who can\u00a0open\u00a0for us,\u00a0I\u00a0always\u00a0supported\u00a0raza bands\u00a0because\u00a0a lot\u00a0of them are my friends and\u00a0a lot\u00a0of them are real fucking good and talented\u00a0chingones,\u201d says Galvan.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0have to\u00a0be raza to\u00a0open up\u00a0for us,\u201d he clarifies before discussing the fine line between pride and racism that exists for any culture. This movement does not intend to exclude anyone but instead\u00a0invite everyone to\u00a0highlight\u00a0the\u00a0local community of\u00a0Chicano\u00a0artists\u00a0and the idea to perform on the nation\u2019s birthday was intentional.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAll it takes is a little bit to cross the line,\u201d says\u00a0Galvan\u00a0who has been happy with the massive success of the other two H-Town Raza Takeovers this year.\u00a0\u201cThis\u00a0time\u00a0for\u00a0the\u00a0Fourth\u00a0of\u00a0Julyit was more\u00a0meaningful because of all the bullshit\u00a0that\u2019s\u00a0going on with this clown in the\u00a0White\u00a0House\u00a0and people just\u00a0having\u00a0a different mentality now\u00a0against immigrants.\u00a0We\u00a0got to\u00a0go back to what really made\u00a0America\u00a0great back in the day which is people from all over the world.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Galvan sees the\u00a0event as\u00a0an\u00a0honoring\u00a0of\u00a0Houston\u2019s Chicano community,\u00a0he\u2019s\u00a0also looking ahead to another milestone for Los\u00a0Skarnales.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s going to be like a kickoff show before we go do this big festival in\u00a0Belgium\u00a0so we are all excited about going.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Their anticipation of performing at the\u00a0Sjock\u00a0Festival is almost five years in the making. \u00a0Galvan remembers that a festival organizer saw the band perform at the Continental Club in Austin and reached out to try to get them involved in the\u00a0festival.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After years of back-and-forth,\u00a0the band is ready to go and join an amazing lineup featuring bands like\u00a0L7, The Dwarves, Joan Jett and many more. \u201cFive years in the making and\u00a0it\u2019sfinally\u00a0going to\u00a0happen, so we are excited about that and the fact that we get to go over there and represent H-town.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0badass,\u201d says Galvan enthusiastically.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bringing their\u00a0talent and hometown love to wider audiences is a perfect manifestation of the\u00a0groups\u00a0unbridled\u00a0energy.\u00a0Since their founding in 1994,\u00a0Los\u00a0Skarnales\u00a0have\u00a0always served as a sort of rite of passage for Houston\u00a0musicians.\u00a0The band has historically had many band members move\u00a0through the lineup\u00a0without\u00a0ever affecting the quality of the music.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI just feel that we are blessed and\u00a0hard\u00a0headed\u00a0enough to keep doing it\u00a0since we changed so many members,\u201d says Galvan\u00a0of\u00a0their longevity.\u00a0\u201cI\u00a0get it,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0hard.\u00a0We\u2019re\u00a0not a cover band that gets\u00a0paid\u00a0good\u00a0and\u00a0a lot of our musicians end\u00a0up\u00a0leaving to make real money.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Galvan credits a combination of including younger\u00a0musicians\u00a0in the lineup\u00a0with\u00a0maintaining\u00a0the band fresh along with the encouragement to always be themselves\u00a0and add their own twist to old songs. \u201cI\u00a0just let everybody bring in their style\u00a0maybe that keeps it different because\u00a0every time\u00a0we play,\u00a0we play this shit different.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Los\u00a0Skarnales\u00a0have been a shot\u00a0in\u00a0the arm for Houston\u2019s Latino and Chicano community helping the scene grow and flourish. \u00a0When asked about teaching younger musicians about the pride and history behind the\u00a0music\u00a0Galvan explains the natural transference.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way it rubs off on the musician,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0very organic.\u00a0They\u2019re\u00a0living it.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0not like you sit down and teach them by the book or something like that.\u201d \u00a0Much like the way their energy is\u00a0contagious\u00a0to their\u00a0audiences,\u00a0Galvan says, \u201cYou get that pride just by being in the band.\u00a0It\u00a0just rubs off\u00a0I\u00a0guess.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Los Skarnales will perform with The Flamin\u2019 Hellcats and St. Judas and The Black Hymns as part of the 4th of July H-Town Raza Takeover, 8 p.m. at Dan Electro\u2019s, 1031 E. 24. For more information visit danelectros.com<\/a> <\/p>\n

\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the\u00a0third\u00a0time, Chicano Boulevard will host the\u00a0H-Town Raza Takeover at Dan Electro\u2019s\u00a0on July 4,\u00a0celebrating\u00a0Houston\u2019s long-standing and powerful Chicano…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":359833,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[127846,127847,226,56,58,57,29324,127848,127849],"class_list":["post-359832","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-chicano-boulevard","tag-dj-mr-simmer-down","tag-homepage","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news","tag-los-skarnales","tag-st-judas-and-the-black-hymns","tag-the-flamin-hellcats"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359832"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359832\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/359833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}