Maybe you don’t remember, or you were too young, or you just, like most, weren’t paying attention to hip-hop in Spanish back then, but there was once, in the late ’90s, a band named Makiza out of Santiago de Chile, and they were really ahead of their time, doing progressive, conscious, jazzy hip-hop in an era when most other rappers in Latin America were still imitating Cypress Hill’s flow. Everybody is familiar nowadays with their former frontwoman, Ana Tijoux, but few outside of Chile know about the other members of Makiza.
Seo2 was Ms. Tijoux’s partner in rhyme for many years, before she went solo and crossed over to international notoriety. After the dissolution of their group, he also continued with a very prolific career, first as the duo Nemesis (with Cenzi, another former Makiza) and later as a solo MC. And while Ana gained more and more exposure outside of the traditional hip-hop niche, he kept feeding the hungry crowd of hardcore hip-hop junkies and b-boys with street bangers packed with irresistible boom-bap beats and his usual wisely crafted verses.
Now, after a year-long hiatus dedicated to battling cancer instead of other MCs, Seo2 is back with another solid solo effort, Reinicio. I know it’s meant as a comeback/rebirth concept album when regarded as part of his body of work, but since most of you out there have yet to discover him, I think it works as an introductory piece, so it could very well be titled “Inicio.”
Download SEO2’s Reinicio below:
