JUAREZ HIP-HOP RESEMBLES NARCOCORRIDOS

Music Balm for Sin-Sick Souls

JUAREZ -- It was hip-hop that saved an emerging Juarez artist's life
- -- and his hand. Jose Aaron Carreon Garcia, aka MC Crimen, was at a
hairdressers' shop popular among gangs in Aguascalientes, Mexico.
Carreon Garcia, 23, wore a bracelet that read "Amor por Juarez," which
in English means love for Juarez.

One day, a man Carreon Garcia refers as "The Don" stepped into the
shop, saw the young man's bracelet and ordered other men to cut off
Carreon Garcia's hand.

"I said, 'No, wait! I am a hip-hop singer, not involved with any
cartel,'" he said.

"The Don" gave him an opportunity to prove he was truthful. He
arranged a meeting at an auto repair shop.

Carreon Garcia rapped for "The Don," who then gave him 4,000 pesos, or
$325, to compose three songs in his honor. Carreon Garcia said he
heard "The Don" on the phone that day order the execution of a federal
police officer. Hours later, a federal agent was killed.

"The Don" is just one of the many stories Carreon Garcia documents in
his songs. And Carreon Garcia is one of at least 10 hip-hop artists in
Juarez attracting national attention because of their lyrics. His
music has even been pirated in Tepito, a Mexico City neighborhood
known for its open-air market, he said, laughing.

Former gang members, these new artists say they are influenced by
American rapper Tupac Shakur. They say the unstoppable bloodshed on
the streets of Juarez inspires them to write. Tupac Shakur was killed
in a drive-by shooting in 1996.

In many ways, the hip-hop songs sound just like Juarez.

The noise of helicopters, machine guns and news reports accompany
their beats. Their lyrics tell cruel tales of people who succumbed to
the temptations of the narco business.

More than 5,200 people have been killed in the city many know as the
epicenter of Mexico's drug cartel violence. There, gang members such
as the Aztecas, La Linea, Mexicles and Artistas Asesinos (Artists
Assassins) do the dirty work for rival Juarez and Sinaloa drug cartels.

The gang violence escalated in 2009, and producer Carlos Ernesto
Romero noticed an increase in his workload in December. He owns
Estrago Records and makes albums for amateur hip-hop singers in Juarez.

"Many artists are writing about our problems," he said.

The difference between reggaeton, the Latin American blend of tropical
and urban-style music, and their hip-hop is simple, these artists say.

Reggaeton songs narrate the weekends, the luxury and the women. Juarez
hip-hop artists write about weekdays and life on the streets.

"Our rap is more about survival, our experiences," Carreon Garcia
said. "It gets more real."

Criminals or artists?

Federal officials arrived at Carreon Garcia's home about a month ago,
he said. They wanted to interview him because they believed he had
ties to the Juarez cartels. Federal police said he knew he was getting
paid to compose music for the cartels.

"I make music of the streets," he said he told the federal
commander.

But these artists do get paid by criminals such as The Don, who bonded
with Carreon Garcia during his short stay in Aguascalientes,
eventually paying Carreon Garcia more than $1,600.

Another music request was by Javier Manuel Ramirez, known in the
streets as El Pando. He has killed people and spent time in the Cereso
prison.

"He was like the puppet of the devil," Carreon Garcia says in a
song.

Ramirez, now a Christian pastor, preaches to a congregation at the
beginning of the track.

Artists also get paid by relatives of drug war victims. In December,
Carreon Garcia said, he sang at the burial of a boy killed by a rival
gang.

In a way, Juarez hip-hop resembles narcocorridos, folk songs popular
in North Mexico and the Southwest United States that tell stories of
drug smugglers, or narcos.

Several hip-hop artists describe themselves "as powerful as Caro
Quintero" in a song.

"Rafael Caro Quintero is a legend," Carreon Garcia
said.

The drug lord preceded famous cartel members such as Sinaloa's Joaquin
"Chapo" Guzman. Caro Quintero was sentenced to 40 years in prison in
Mexico for the murder of a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent,
Enrique Camarena, and his pilot, Alfredo Zavala, in the 1980s.

Drug-dealing tales

Carreon Garcia admits he became involved with gangs at a young
age.

His father was a Latin Kings gang member in Los Angeles. Carreon
Garcia was raised mostly by his mother in Juarez. He dropped out of
middle school and never attended high school. When he was 10 or 11, he
developed an interest in lowriders. "I associated lowriders with gangs
in my 'hood," he said.

At 13, he became a drug addict and then dealer. He worked in Juarez's
corners all the way until he was 21. He left the gang because of his
sons, he said.

Victor Aguero Espinoza, aka Obio, calls himself the "poet of the
hoods." The Juarez man gets paid to write lyrics and to perform. In
the song "Asi se hace," in English, "That is how you do it," Aguero
Espinoza describes how he made a living delivering drugs for his
clients in Horizon City and Socorro.

Aguero Espinoza, 25, said his drug dealing was based in Horizon City,
in East El Paso County.

"I moved the drugs everywhere," he said. "I was the
boss."

A turning point in Aguero Espinoza's gang life occurred one day when a
50-pound drug load was lost in rural San Elizario. He got a call from
members of a cartel.

Men picked him up at the Zaragoza international bridge and took him to
a ranch in the Valley of Juarez. There, he saw a high-ranking police
official with a map pointing out where the load could have been lost.
When Aguero Espinoza recognized another man the cartel members were
torturing on the floor, they threatened to kill Aguero Espinoza.

The men freed Aguero Espinoza so he could find the truck with the drug
load and sell it on the U.S. side, he said.

Before he knew it, Aguero Espinoza said, he was working directly for
the cartel.

After living in Horizon for five years, he moved back to Juarez in
2008 to be with his wife. A year later, he stopped selling drugs
because the killings began hitting close to home.

"I cannot be calm," he said. "But the music has given me
peace."

Peace for Juarez

Aguero Espinoza attacks the Mexican government in his songs. His
lyrics, in essence, say authorities are corrupt and cannot be trusted.

Carreon Garcia also said the government is hypocritical.

"It is the medium I use to express social discontent," he said. He
hears the radio and watches TV news to get inspiration for his songs.

When federal police arrived at Carreon Garcia's home to question him,
a local police commander told him they brought national reporters to
conduct interviews.

The police commander told him not to talk about drug cartels, gangs or
anything that could damage his reputation.

"Don't forget to mention social prevention programs in the city," he
said the commander told him.

"I cannot say they are helping me. I am helping them ... I felt used
by the authorities," he said.

Both Aguero Espinoza and Carreon Garcia volunteer in community centers
in Bavicora, the Juarez police district. They work spreading the
message among Juarez's youth that the narco life is dangerous.

The youth in Juarez are perhaps the most vulnerable to brutal attacks,
they said.

"The cartels are using gangs and filling them with weapons and drugs,"
Carreon Garcia said. "They are abused because they are very young boys."