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Fiel a la Vega

House of Blues Orlando welcomed Puerto Rican rock band Fiel a la Vega last Saturday, April 15, when they performed to a nearly sold-out crowd.

The stop was a continuation of their retrospective presentations that began on the Island late last year, marking the twentieth anniversary of their formation as a group and their eponymous debut album.

It would be far easier to make a list of the songs they didn't play, including the expected acoustic set of covers that is already ingrained in people's minds.

Fiel a la Vega is: Tito Auger (vocals, guitar), Ricky Laureano (vocals, lead guitar), Jorge Arraiza (bass, backing vocals), and Pedro Arraiza (drums, backing vocals). They were also accompanied by Francisco González on keyboards.

The local Puerto Rican diaspora is always eager to absorb and react enthusiastically to anything that brings them closer to the Island. Auger promised the crowd that they would be received and welcomed back home with open arms, at any moment, independently from any circumstance that drove them away in the first place. After singing his heart out and giving their all on stage, the feeling was definitely mutual. 

In a show more than three hours long, Fiel a la Vega's message was loud and clear. A message delivered with the same energy as when they started more than twenty years ago. A message of social and political awareness. A message of national pride and love for the country. A message about the direness of its current situation. A message of hope for what's next. 

That's where we come from.

Y eso no es de donde quiera.

Special thanks to Eleven 11 Communications for the opportunity to photograph during this show.

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Dweezil Zappa

Dweezil Zappa brought his show to The Plaza Live in Orlando last Saturday, as part of his 50 Years of Frank tour. Last year marked the 50th anniversary of Freak Out!, Frank Zappa's first album with his band The Mothers of Invention. The show (and tour) is Dweezil's way to pay tribute to this album and to the prolific career of his late father, who released more than 60 albums in over 30 years.

The current lineup of Dweezil's band include: Ryan Brown on drums, Kurt Morgan on bass, Chris Norton on keyboards, David Luther on vocals, sax, keyboards and guitar, multi-instrumentalist Scheila Gonzalez, and Cian Coey on lead vocals. (It's also fair to include Dweezil's Gibson Roxy SG as an obligatory member of the band.)

It's definitely a daunting task trying to condense more than fifty years of music history in one night. Montana, Apostrophe, Black Napkins, The Illinois Enema Bandit, and Muffin Man were just a handful of what Dweezil and company had in store for the night. The encore included Michael Winslow (of Police Academy fame) channeling his inner Hendrix on stage, while the band played Cosmik Debris. It was a perfect night for all the hardcore Zappa fans in the audience. The sound was impeccable, and the trip down memory lane was unforgettable.

In recent years Dweezil's career has been immersed in legal drama, after the Zappa Family Trust has been trying to prevent him from using his own family name to perform and preserve the music of his father.

The full name of the tour is 50 Years of Frank: Dweezil Zappa Plays Whatever The F@%k He Wants. And he should. He must. In a way, it's a good thing that constraints can make us more creative. Hopefully all the absurdity can be worked out soon, so he can continue to freely maintain the legacy of the Zappa legend.

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V's Blog

Photography is my passion. Writing on napkins is my hobby. I love making new images and writing about them. This is my virtual supply of napkins. Comments and discussions are encouraged.

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