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El Bles | Producer Artist

@elbles

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🇵🇷 boricua beatsmith.
🔊 sonic world builder.
cultural storytelling through sampled - based music.
enter ‘BUYAKA’ ⤵️

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

FAMILIA! BUYAKA. Now on wax.

🚨 LIMITED TO 25 COPIES 🚨

Side A - The Album
Side B - Instrumentals, exclusively available on vinyl.

Pre-orders are now open at ⤵️
BUYAKA.SHOP

🔗 en bio! taken in San Juan, Puerto Rico by @elbles

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2 months ago

I ❤️ PR ! La Peste A Coco! Track by @elbles #donrimx #lapesteacoco by @elbles

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15 days ago

Es Bueno Colaborar con personas talentosas que uno personalmente admira. Siempre salen cosas las que uno se siente bien ! Aqui el proceso del trabajo hecho para la presentacion del “NUDO” by @elbles @goodwithsub @donrimx @donutshoppe Gracias a todas las personas que apoyan con su presencia y coleccionan nuestro Arte ! De esa manera podemos seguir creando proyectos . #lapesteacoco taken in Orlando, Florida by @elbles

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19 days ago

THE WORLD OF BUYAKA. 💥🔫😈

As the album started taking shape, so did the visual world around it.

We wanted BUYAKA to live somewhere between black & white, grayscale, rugged, tactical and raw. From there, we started searching for the environment that could bring that vision to life.

We found an abandoned house that became the backdrop and helped us paint the visual picture we had in our heads.

We searched through every shadow, every angle, every frame looking for the image that could hold the weight of BUYAKA.

Shoutout to @bnegrf 📸 for stepping into that world with us and capturing it with precision.

These photographs didn’t make the final album artwork, but they were too powerful to leave unseen.

WWW.BUYAKA.SHOP

Which frame would you have chosen? taken in St. Cloud, Florida by @elbles

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24 days ago

September 2016

I released I AM LATIN SOUL (IALS) - my first fully conceptualized project.

Before IALS, I had already spent over a decade producing, digging, sampling and experimenting.. developing my sound. Understanding better what made my musical voice mine.

IALS was the project where those pieces finally connected.

One album sat at the center of the inspiration:

Ray Barretto’s ACID.

@faniarecords, 1968.

When I heard that album, I heard something deeper.

I heard Hip-Hop before Hip-Hop had a name.

The drums.
The breaks.
The repetition.
The attitude.
The rawness.

The African and Caribbean DNA was already there.

IALS became my exploration of how that DNA lives inside the very fabric of Hip-Hop.

📸 by @jkellerfilm

Even the artwork was intentional.

The vejigante represented who we are at our core: Puerto Rican, no matter where we live.

But I inverted the idea of the mask.

Living in the diaspora, we often put on a social “mask” to fit in - to look, speak and act according to what society considers normal.

In the artwork, my actual face is that mask.

Behind it, the vejigante reveals what lives underneath: our Puerto Rican identity, our folklore, and our African and Caribbean roots.

At a time when our cultural identity had little visibility in the urban space, the vejigante wasn’t there simply because it looked dope.

It was there to say:

This is who we are!!

(*Art work for my first single, “SOULA” by Jose Estrada.)

IALS wasn’t only about connecting musical history but about understanding my place within it.

It gave me a way to express the Puerto Rican, Afro-Caribbean and Hip-Hop influences that had shaped me..and finally claim them as my own musical identity.

Today, seeing Puerto Rican culture celebrated on a massive global stage is beautiful.

10 years ago, when this imagery wasn’t nearly as visible in the mainstream, I wanted it front and center.

Not as nostalgia.

As identity.

Artwork for my second single, “OYELÓJ” by Jose Estrada.

Slowly the vejigante mask underneath starts to reveal.

IALS was also the first time I invested in a real PR campaign.

@naticonrazon believed in this project and helped carry that vision far beyond my imme taken in Orlando, Florida by @elbles

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a month ago

DECONSTRUCTED 💥

breaking down the layers behind “Levy’s Lament” off the BUYAKA EP..from the foundation to the details that brought the beat together.

this project was built to be collected, not just streamed.

BUYAKA lives exclusively on Bandcamp + vinyl.

SIDE B holds the instrumentals exclusively 🤫💿

25 copies. That’s it.

produced & mixed by @elbles
performed by @theogninja

⬇️⬇️⬇️
🎧 WWW.BUYAKA.SHOP

What part of the beat caught your ear first? taken in Downtown Orlando by @elbles

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a month ago

“BUYAKA” an Album by @elbles & @theogninja
• Official Album Art + Alternatives + Track-list + Vinyl Mock-Up

Photography by @bnegrf
Design + Art Direction by 𝖘𝖚𝖇. taken in Orlando, Florida by @elbles

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a month ago

TODAY IS BANDCAMP FRIDAY. 💥

A bigger share of every purchase goes directly to the artists.

BUYAKA
LIMITED EDITION VINYL + TEES AVAILABLE NOW.

25 VINYL COPIES.
SIDE A THE ALBUM.
SIDE B THE INSTRUMENTALS.

WWW.BUYAKA.SHOP 💿🔫😈 taken in Downtown Orlando by @elbles

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a month ago

BUYAKA DECONSTRUCTED 💥

“RHYMES IN CURSIVE” ✍🏽

Breaking down the samples, chops + pieces behind one of my favorites from BUYAKA.

What are you hearing first? 👂🏽

The instrumentals live EXCLUSIVELY on the vinyl.
⬇️⬇️⬇️
WWW.BUYAKA.SHOP 💿

BUYAKA BUYAKA BUYAKA 💥🔫😈 taken in Downtown Orlando by @elbles

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2 months ago

island life 🏝️ no hay más na’ 🤞🏽 taken in 100 X 35 by @elbles

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2 months ago

“QUITE SUM TIME”

FULL VIDEO ON YOUTUBE 📺

WWW.BUYAKA.SHOP 💥🔫😈 taken in Orlando, Florida by @elbles

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2 months ago

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2 months ago