One hot summer afternoon, about 15 years ago, on the corner of my street, next to a dumpster, stood a box full of old records. I was stunned that someone was capable of throwing records in the trash! Come on, to throw away music! Unbelievable☹Looking at the assortment of records stashed in the cardboard box, the whole period of the ‘50s and ‘60s was discarded in the street. Someone’s life, youth was kicked out next to a dumpster!!

That time, that was standing next to the dumpster, was a hard post-war time, a time when Yugoslavia just started changing after the frustrating Soviet domination and the infamous feud between Yugoslavia and USSR. It was a time of hunger, yellow cheese and powdered eggs from UNRRA packages, which were delivered from around the world as a form of help; a time when we watched soviet and domestic war movies in the cinema, sang „Kaćuša“and revolutionary work songs. Suddenly, unexpected, arrived from Mexico, thousands of kilometers away by air, a “kind of music that was neither Eastern nor Western”, the type that was perfect for the political leadership of the time and the moment when the country was recovering from the historic NO to Stalin. Before mass media as we know today, when information, records, movies and culture in general arrived slow, those Mexican politically neutral songs were like made for citizens of Yugoslavia. From a nonimperial country, which ended its revolution at the beginning of the XX century, arrived movies with the theme of small people fighting the powerful and as such, were ideal for screening in a country that shared Mexico’s experience with a revolutionary fight. Famous Mexican revolutionaries, Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata, were adored by the Yugoslav movie goers. With such a movie, Mexico found its way into the hearts of the Yugoslav people.

With the movie “One day of life” (Un día de vida), by Mexican director Emilio Fernandez, who, said in today’s manner, broke the box office records of Yugoslav cinemas at the time, along came the song ,,Mamma huanita“, which became an ultimate hit and led to the formation of popular Yugoslav Mexican music groups. That phenomenon was so unusual and important that it became known in the history of Yugoslav music as YUMEX (Yugoslav Mexican songs).

The movie “One day of life” is a story about two men in the Mexican revolution, once close friends, now find themselves on opposing sides due to circumstances. One is the officer, while the other is being visited by his mother while on death row; his mother, unaware that her son’s ex-friend is now his enemy. And that’s where drama unfolds. The Yugoslav movie goers were enchanted by the movie to the point that it was shown in Zagreb 284 days in a row, while the song “Mama Huanita” became so popular that local musicians started playing it at weddings and celebrations. Soon after this, appeared the first Yugoslav Mexicans, who dressed in Mexican attire, performed Mexican songs in Serbo-Croatian language, and not just translations of existing Mexican songs, but also original songs composed in this manner.

Often funny, the lyrics of these songs were very attractive for the audience back in the day. Very macho, HE is independent, strong, alfa male with a mustache who likes to drink, to seduce and kiss women… who could resist him? No one. Sometimes he would complain if a lady left him, but everyone knows that it’ll last for just a moment, that already the next day he will be with a new girlfriend, whose heart he would, of course, break, happily starting from the beginning. Similarly, Ljubomir Milić, who sang in the famous bend “Paloma”, complains in a song how his wife doesn’t understand how he can’t come home on time due to all the women who surround him and adore him, and whom he can’t resist, making divorce inevitable.

How else? Arriba Mexicooooooo 😊

My wife always tells me
how I wander all around
Like I don’t care about her
I come home after dawn.
What can I do when I’m always
In company of beautiful women
And when always at least one
is pulling my shoulder…

The above mentioned Ljubomir Milić was the most famous Yugoslav Mexican and literally looked the part: a thin moustache, Mexican sombrero, traditional outfit- he and the entire Paloma band embodied the full Mexican folklore. The songs were also exotic, addressing 'serious' topics :“ Don’t comfort other people’s women“ (come on!), „Alone like the wind“, „Let me suffer when I love her“ (I’m going to start crying, sniff sniff), „Ladie’s man“ (of course), „don’t get married“ (many would say it’s not a bad idea). 😉 Even though Mr. Milić was unofficially the most typical Yugoslav Mexican, Montenegrin Nikola Karović was also a Mexican who ruled the Yugoslav music scene of that time, so much so that he was invited to sing at the reception for Mexican president Adolf Lopez Mateos. On the other hand, Slavko Perović, one of most famous Yugoslav Mexican, claims in his song that he is the real Mexican.

I’m a real Mexican
I’m the pride of my region
Wherever I go, people love me
Everyone loves my smile
I have a horse and a sombrero
I love my heart’s song
All nights are always mine
Me- That’s my life

Yugoslav Mexican music dominated for almost a decade, and who knows for how long it would continue being the mainstream of Yugoslav popular music, if it hadn’t been for – rock’n’roll. Personally, as a child, I never liked that 'puy puy' shrieking, spurs, a sombrero, etc. When I first heard rock’n’roll on my radio, from the waves of Radio Luxembourg, everything else stopped existing.

Still, as a very interesting, so to speak, an unusual phenomenon in the history of pop music, the decade of Mexican music in Yugoslavia will be remembered. The heroes of this “sombrero’’ era in the 1950’s and 1960’s were Nikola Karović, Slavko Perović, Ljubomir Milić, Miroslava Mrđa, Ana Milosavljević, Nevenka Arsova, the bands "TiViDi", "Tenori" ,"Paloma"... The music that arrived from revolutionary Mexico was replaced by a true global music revolution– rock’n’roll. And that’s where any talk about revolution ends.

Adios muchachos, long live r’n’roll!

JJBeba