Chris Piszczek and Sebastián Daniel (aka Chris P. and Sebas), better known as Browns Crew, hail from the South Side of Milwaukee. It’s not the South Side you hear about on a breaking news segment, and it’s not the South Side being taken over by carbon copies of look-alike lofts pricing out folks with roots in the area. It’s the South Side—the one with a rich, decades-spanning history of Latinos making music in the Midwest, an unmistakable sense of community spirit among those that live there, generations of people advocating for positive change and a strong sense of pride in its immigrant roots.
“I think it’s sad that other folks have controlled our narrative so much that people will say stuff like, ‘It’s good that this is being gentrified, because this was dirty and nasty,’ and stuff like that,” says Chris P. “We have so many assets in our community like who our neighbors are and historic spots.” Assets like the nationally renowned Latino Arts Strings Program through the United Community Center, which both members say they would like to see more of across the city.
“It should be a regular thing, because our culture is so rich,” Sebas adds. “We come from music, dancing, drumming and movement. You know?”
Chris and Sebas met back in middle school and naturally befriended each other given their love for the arts. They explored an array of genres like jazz, old-school hip-hop and alternative rock in their early teenage years, and, not long after, they moved onto freestyling over the series of beats their friends would create at (and on) the lunch table.
However, it wasn’t until they took a trip to Mexico around the age of 18 that the childhood friends started to consider turning their interest in freestyling at parties into a more serious music project (Chris laughs and says Sebas was actually the one that pushed him to record and release material). But jokes aside, it’s clear that the trip to Oaxaca holds much significance for a number of reasons as they recount their summer there. It also served as an opportunity for them to connect with local teacher and worker communities doing grassroots activism. “That’s where we came up with the name Browns Crew,” Chris states. “Being conscious of brown pride, our culture and how we came up. It’s also a play on the term ‘grounds crew’ and thinking about the [earth], who works it and maintains it.”
The duo draws influences from bolero super-trio Los Panchos and alternative hip-hop heavyweights like Black Star and A Tribe Called Quest. They’re especially determined to keep some of those key elements like socially conscious lyrics, storytelling and traditional instrumentation alive through their music. Despite working in what they say were rewarding positions at local non-profits and in educational fields, both Chris and Sebas made the decision to reactivate Browns Crew earlier last year.
Browns Crew’s latest single, “Mil Aires,” features the psychedelic rock-saturated Peruvian-style cumbia (sometimes referred to as cumbia “chicha”) sounds from Argentina-based Agrupacion Ilegal Los Imparciales (“Los Imparciales” for short). Browns Crew says they had spent some time checking out different artist profiles via Soundcloud and Bandcamp in hopes of finding a potential collaborator that could map out the vibe and sonic structure they were looking for. The duo was immediately sold on Los Imparciales, and the only step left was to ask the Buenos Aires-based group if they would be willing to record an instrumental piece that Browns Crew could pen lyrics to, to which they agreed.
Treble-y surf guitar plays off of an assemblage of percussion instruments (complete with cowbells and timbaletas) that drives the hypnotic pace of the song as Chris and Sebas sing “Soy cumbiero y curandero/digo lo que siento/Hago lo que quiero,” “Solo soy un niño callejero/Bien rico con poco dinero/Bailando paso a pasito/En la vida no hay prisa/hay que darle despacito.”
The motive behind “Mil Aires” is evident within the first few seconds of listening: Los Imparciales and Browns Crew are here for the resistance, but they came here to get everybody moving first, or better yet, to “bailar y gozar.”
“I feel like what we’re doing is very closely connected to the roots of hip-hop. There’s a code,” says Sebas. “I think we keep those principles alive when it comes to building up our community, empowering ourselves and having our voices heard. Hip-hop was birthed in the hood. It’s like we’re the branches of that tree. I want to think of us as watering those roots and keeping those things but also infusing our own thoughts, visions and experiences.”
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Browns Crew will play at the Summer Soulstice Festival on Saturday, June 22, and on Thursday, June 27, at Summerfest.
