Mexican Institute of Sound

Mexican Institute of Sound are not the school where Mexican artists learn to sell records in the U.S. but the one-man Latin lounge project of Mexico City label honcho Camilo Lara. Unlike their studio wiz colleagues Nortec Collective’s electro-Calexico sound, MIS are an extension of Lara’s work with lovable Mexican goofballs Plastilina Mosh, continuing in the same cheesy vibe that has made a lot of this stuff highly annoying. While there are some danceable beats ("Escribeme Pronto”), they are ruined by agitating, child-like voice samples that don’t let up. "A Todos Ellos” uses the same shout-outs to anyone who’s anyone, which have been done a million times, only diversifying slightly by name-dropping Compay Segundo and Tom Jobim with Notorious B.I.G. and Kurt Cobain. The one saving grace is an excellent little slice of Latin hip-hop on "El Microfono,” which should inspire Lara to stick with this genre. Especially since a new P-Mosh is due. The other thing is it’s hard to picture where people will actually listen to this. It’s not going to get you laid and it’s too difficult to actually dance to. My recommendation is to sell it to all-inclusive resorts and it can be the soundtrack to getting drunk on coco-locos instead of that generic reggaeton shit they play at ten in the morning.