Music

Edith Mayta’s Huayno Cover of “El Taxi” Blew Up the Peruvian Internet This Week

Peru has offered the world many amazing musical treasures. Wendy Sulca may be an adult now but she still charms the world with her voice. La Tigresa Del Oriente continues to do her thing and will probably keep doing so well into her nineties. Now there’s a new addition to this ensemble and her name is Edith Mayta.

Mayta, who describes herself as a chica alegre y humilde, blew up the Internet this week with a Huayno cover of “El Taxi.” Anyone who went to a club last summer should recognize that song title. It’s a track by Osmani Garcia featuring Pitbull and Sensato.

There aren’t any sexy chicas in fancy whips riding around in revealing clothing in Mayta’s video. Nor is there any obvious borrowing from “Murder She Wrote” by Chaka Demur & The Pliers. Instead, there’s some beautiful scenery of the Peruvian countryside, a large wind section of dudes probably wondering WTF they’re doing in the video, and three masked women who beat up another masked dude in a Policia Nacional vest. Okay then!