RH+
Location: Santiago
Bio: Nacional Records is proud to announce the February 3rd release of RH+’s U.S. debut album ‘Quintana Roo’. With a dreamy electronic pop sound that recalls ... (more)
groups like Broken Social Scene, Stereolab or Air, one may easily guess RH+ is a band from Toronto, London or Paris, rather than Santiago, Chile, deep in the heart of South America. Fusing indie rock with electronica, RH+’s music is characterized by their dueling male and female English vocals and atmospheric keyboard textures.
While RH+ attributes much of their primary musical influences to bands in North America and Europe, drummer/programmer Pedro Comparini connects their music’s dreamy vibe to their Chilean hometown. “In Santiago, we are lucky to have a very close relationship with both nature and the city at the same time and that inspires our songwriting a lot,” he says. “Our imaginations, our dreams and mixing contrasting ideas are essential elements to our musical muse.”
Formed in 2002, RH+ was originally known as “Rock Hudson” to fans. The band quickly established themselves as a leading act in the Santiago alt rock scene with explosive performances at clubs and festivals across the city. They released their Chilean debut album ‘La Elela’ in 2004 and soon after, Comparini and lead singer Ximena “Nera” Muñoz moved to Europe for two years of studies in Milan, Italy. Europe proved to be both a source for songwriting inspiration and a receptive audience for the band’s sound.
“In Milan, I had a lot of time to dedicate myself to music,” Nera explains. “Pedro and I wrote many songs, some in Italian that would later be translated to English, and then a couple bossanova tracks as well.”
In 2005, RH+ performed at the popular Diesel U Music Festival in Milan and were awarded the “Best Electronic Band”. The group decided to take that momentum on the road, performing in Berlin, Amsterdam and Barcelona and across much of Western Europe.
“While our English vocals may sometimes limit us back home in Chile (even though we can see this changing), we get the opposite response in Europe,” Comparini says. “Every time that we play in Europe, the venues are full and the response is tremendous. Living over there, we were six hours from any European capital and we played that to our advantage.”
Moving back home to Chile, RH+ completed their second album ‘Quintana Roo’ with production assistance from local beatmaster and Nacional labelmate DJ Bitman. The album was very well received in their native country and Rolling Stone Chile named it one of the best albums of the year.
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