MARIACHI EL BRONX w/ MAX DIAZ

MARIACHI EL BRONX w/ MAX DIAZ

Thursday October 15th, 2026

Doors 7pm - Show 8pm

18+

$30 Advance - $35 Day of Show

Mariachi El Bronx

Mariachi El Bronx IV

After a 10 year hiatus, the beloved Los Angeles trailblazers Mariachi El Bronx are dusting off

their charro suits again. The alter ego of punk rock heroes The Bronx, this band’s unexpected

headlining career began back in 2008 after the hardcore group sought ways to grow creatively

while celebrating the Hispanic music and culture they were surrounded by growing up in Los

Angeles. Although seemingly different, the band doesn’t see the genres of punk and mariachi as

mutually exclusive - to them, punk and mariachi are spiritually entwined forces rooted in resilient

storytelling. “Punk rock and mariachi music are very similar in soul,” says songwriter and lead

vocalist Matt Caughthran. “It's working class music. It’s real music.”

With three acclaimed albums to their name, the eight-piece has shared stages with the Foo

Fighters and the Killers, performed everywhere from Letterman to NPR’s Tiny Desk, and lit up

festivals from Coachella to Glastonbury. They even lent their sound to TV, recording theme

songs for Weeds (“Little Boxes”) and Aqua Teen Hunger Force (“Aqua Something You Know

Whatever”). Returning after a decade away felt “joyous and familiar from the jump,” says

guitarist Joby J. Ford.

But recording their fourth album, Mariachi El Bronx IV, proved more complex than expected.

Within the year that he began writing lyrics, Caughthran contended with the deaths of several

loved ones. Additionally, as they tracked at producer John Avila's San Gabriel Valley studio -

Avila has helmed all four of their mariachi records - the Eaton Canyon fires blazed across East

LA. “We came out of the studio one night, the entire side of the hill was just on fire,” Ford

recalls. While dealing with grief in his personal life and within his longtime home of Southern

California, Caughthran was also experiencing an enormity of love as he got married that same

year.

These clashing emotions of profound loss and overwhelming love shaped the album's themes.

The songwriting "started as a battle between love and death but became a way to process "all

the chaos of the world," Caughthran says. Throughout Mariachi El Bronx IV’s 12 tracks the band

document the stories of gamblers, former playboys, warriors, lovers - characters that became

vessels for the specific pressures of being alive right now. The contemporary disillusionment

with love underscores the “RIP Romeo,” for instance, which Caughthran describes as both the

death of Romeo as a figure and a culture in mourning.

That push and pull is palpable on a song like “Forgive Or Forget,” the album’s high-octane

opener. Amidst its galloping rhythm, a uniquely hallucinogenic tone emerges from Ray Suen’s

violin that complements Caughthran’s lyrics about someone “who’s completely disheveled and a

little washed out, looking back on their life in a way that's kind of hazy,” he says. “There's a little

bit of hope there, but it's pretty dark.”

Another single, “Song Bird,” tackles a different kind of terror: writer’s block. Caughthran was

going through a rough bout of zapped creativity when the band’s Vincent Hidalgo came up with

a pulse-quickening guitar line in the studio. To Caughthran, the riff reminded him of a

hummingbird flapping its wings - the same bird he'd watch outside his writing window. The

block faded instantly as lyrics poured out of his brain: “I was staring at another empty page /

Feeling every single second of my age.”

The fighting spirit of Mariachi El Bronx emerges on the Norteño charged “Bandoleros,” which

they describe as the “battle cry of the album.” At a time when chaos is surging around the world

and close to home, the call to arms that imbued these feelings of courage and righteous

indignation. The song concludes on a hard-won note of heroism: “We ride out / No matter how

bad it may seem.”

With four albums now under their belts as Mariachi El Bronx, the band still considers

themselves lifelong students of mariachi; its members strive to continue progressing in their

musicianship while paying homage to this storied artform. That reverence carries over to their

iconic charro suits, which often attract nearly as much attention as the music itself. The band

has long turned to Casa del Mariachi in Boyle Heights - a shop honored by the city as a historic

landmark - where Jorge Tello (aka Mr. George) has been handcrafting traditional suits for more

than 50 years. "This band has always been about learning and exchanging culture through

music and art,” says Caughthran. “That’s what it’s all about! Everything we do comes from the

heart and soul.”

Mariachi El Bronx is Matt Caughthran (vocals), Joby J. Ford (guitar, accordion), Jared

Shavelson (drums), Keith Douglas (trumpet), Ray Suen (violin), Brad Magers (trumpet), Ken

Horne (jarana), and Vincent Hidalgo (guitarrón).