Culcha Candela

Culcha Candela is a Reggae-/Dancehall-/Hip-Hop-Musikgruppe from Berlin, founded in 2002 with an international cast that portrays herself multi-ethnic. Their lyrics range from serious, socio-critical content ( Una cosa ..., Brave New World ) to mood-elevating songs ( party bus ). The name " Culcha Candela " means something like "hot culture."

  • 5.1 Studio albums

Career

Culcha Candela even lay their foundation on July 7, 2002 through the band members Johnny Strange, Itchyban and Lafrotino. Gradually yet Larsito, Mr. Reedoo, Don Cali, and DJ Chino were added. The different backgrounds of the members is also reflected in the music resists, rapping and singing as the band members in English, German, Spanish, and Patois. In the following years they gave numerous concerts, in 2004 came the debut album Union Verdadera out, which went even in the German charts.

The group was together with Saïan Supa Crew, Gentleman and the Söhne Mannheims on tour. In May 2005, a remix of Sientelo, the reggaeton hit the Puerto Rican Speedy and the U.S. singer Lumidee released. On September 12, followed in 2005 by the second album Next Generation, which was also the occasion for the first own tour. It is similar in style to its predecessor, was therefore largely influenced by reggae.

On 10 August 2007 appeared with Hamma! the first single of the published August 31, 2007 third album Culcha Candela. The direct entry at # 1 on 24 August 2007, the band succeeded in surprising the biggest success of her career so far. Over the next six weeks, they were able to defend first place in the singles charts successful. Hamma! later reached platinum. There followed a Hamma! Tour in Germany. The second single from the album Ey DJ appeared on 23 November 2007.

On 14 February 2008, the band represented her hometown of Berlin with the song Chica at the Federal Vision Song Contest at the TUI Arena, in which they finished in seventh place.

On 28 August 2009 her fourth studio album, Brave New World, for which they were awarded in Germany in 2011 with platinum and in Switzerland with gold appeared. The album spent over a year in the German charts. Stylistically, it was based on its predecessor, there are party songs, serious songs, but also two ballads on it. The first single from the eponymous song was released Beautiful new world in which it comes to the social, political development and the environment. The second single Monsta appeared on 22 October, it reached gold in Germany and in Switzerland even platinum. Third single was ice cold, which was published on 19 March 2010. In the summer of 2010, the fourth and final single was released Somma im Kiez.

In November 2010, Culcha Candela three weeks long, at the invitation of the Goethe Institute in Central America on tour. This year Lafrotino left the band.

On 22 October 2010 she released her first best-of album The Best, on which there are four songs of their old albums, as well as three new songs: Move It, Berlin City Girl and General. The first single Move It was published on 8 October and rose in the German charts at No. 7 as second single on 14 January 2011 was released as a Berlin City Girl We Edition Remix.

On May 27, they entered the König-Pilsener- Arena in Oberhausen, Germany at the award ceremony of the VIVA Comet 2011 and also received the award in the category Best Band awarded. After the award ceremony, they announced the end of the year on a new album, whose first song they introduced on their tour: Hungry Eyes.

On September 20 Culcha Candela were nominated for the MTV EMA 2011 for Best German Act, but were at the awards ceremony in November from empty.

In July 2011, she then promised the fifth studio album for the beginning of December. On August 19, they announced that the album will be released on 2 December and the end of September they announced that the album will be called Flätrate and moved the release date to November 25. On November 4, Hungry Eyes was released as a single, two weeks before the video. On November 11, they released the first promotional single the title track Flätrate and a week later the second promotional single Big Fat Smile. After the title Wildes Ding had celebrated radio premiere on 14 December, a week later appeared the music video. On January 6, the single and the jungle version of the song that is the theme song for RTL Jungle Camp 2012 appeared. On March 8, 2012, they began their 15 -concert tour Flätrate with a concert in Dresden and performed three weeks later, the final concert in their hometown Berlin before about 7,000 fans. The third single from alone was also placed in the top 20 of the Media Control Charts. In May they started to Flätrate Open Air tour, where they will be performing at various festivals.

The end of 2012, they announced that they will take a break next year, it should neither concerts take place, nor new music to be published. Instead, they wanted to work on solo projects. So Laristo offered drum workshops, Johnny Strange was involved in the organization Africa Rise, Don Cali produced as part of the project KAO music, Chino and Itchy acted as Itchinosound, while the latter Mateo even recorded an album.

On September 11, 2013 were the first time publicly that a new album was in the pipeline.

Style and content over time

Early in her career, she mixed mainly the genres reggae, salsa and dancehall. The music was recorded almost entirely live in the studio with instruments, either by themselves or by guest musicians. On their first two albums, they still sing evenly distributed in German, Spanish and English, or patois, in the song Back to Our Roots Johnny Strange even sings in Swahili. They also made even more value to texts with social and polit -sensitive content, such as in Una Cosa, a song against cocaine use, or Mother Earth, which advocates for environmental awareness. Furthermore, they played frequently with their different cultures and their diversity.

With the next albums changed the style: On the album Culcha Candela are more dancehall and pop songs and instead Revolution with only a reggae track. It is also striking that they auskoppelten only a single with not only German texts. With Brave New World, they moved even further away from reggae and even the language distribution was now different: They sing mainly in German and all extractions involve only German lyrics. Furthermore, only have the songs Brave New World and standing on a socio-political content. The first single, for example, criticizes with much irony today's consumer society and also addresses environmental problems. With Flätrate they distanced themselves almost completely from their original musical roots: Many more items from the electronic music and house are used, only a few sites were recorded with musical instruments and their voices were also revised with Auto-Tune. They focus more on content and less on entertainment and fun critique or social content.

Live performances

Tours as a headliner

  • Next Generation Tour (2005-2006)
  • Hamma - Tour 2007
  • Culcha Candela Tour 2008
  • Brave New World Tour 2009
  • Beautiful New World Additional Tour ( 2010)
  • Culcha Candela Tour 2011
  • Flätrate Tour 2012

With nearly 700 live performances and some 250 concerts a year Culcha Candela are an active live band. Although it has been, with the increasing success of the extent of their tours smaller since 2009, but since they are often heard at festivals and open-air events, the number of occurrences is not greatly diminished. So they played several times at the Chiemsee Reggae Summer, Rock am Ring, Rock im Park, Danube Island Festival, the Hurricane and Southside Festival or at the Munich Summer Night's Dream, whose headliners they were in 2012.

Frequently used items

  • Culcha Candela walk: All fans move during the action to the left and right and walk at the words "everybody get down " into the squat. The walk was first held on the Brave New World Tour in 2009 and is found on any of their concerts.
  • Bamboo sticks: Since 2011 Culcha Candela play a three minute song only with the rhythms of bamboo sticks.
  • Hamma -Move: To Flätrate Tour 2012 they invented a simple dance to the chorus of Hamma! .

Before the start of the concert, the stage is also always with a big flag on which the band's logo is seen veiled.

Social Commitment

Culcha Candela has collaborated on projects with the DVD Kein Bock on Nazis, an initiative that is directed against the ideas of the NPD and neo-Nazism.

Johnny Strange, whose real name is John Lwanga, founded in April 2008, the organization Africa Rise, whose goal is the development work in Africa and exchange between Germany and Africa to promote. In the cultural events such as the 50th anniversary of Uganda, the home of Johnny Strange, this very regularly performs with other band members.

For the association Action! Kidz, which campaigns against child labor, they were in 2012 one of the prominent partners.

Even when launched by the Bertelsmann Foundation Initiative All Kids are VIPs they act as ambassadors. Your goal is fair educational opportunities in the German education system. With the integration of competition it comes to students and teachers to encourage them to carry on strong for more fairness and integration in school life.

Discography

Studio albums

Awards

  • Comet 2011: for Best Band

Nominations:

  • Comet 2008: for Best Band
  • 2008: for Best Song ( Hamma! )
  • 2010: for Best Party Song ( Monsta)
  • 2010: Best Live Act for
  • 2011: for Best Party Song ( Berlin City Girl)
  • Echo 2008: for National Artist / Group Hip- Hop / R & B
  • MTV EMA 2011: for Best German Act
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