Extended Biography

In the year 2000, Libedinsky, musical director of NARCOTANGO, starts dancing tango and this experience was a turning point in his musical interests. The intensity of the milonga, the new expressions developed by dancers on the dance floor and the inclusion of a lot of young people in the music of Buenos Aires, which during decades had been targeted to grandparents of the 30 and 40 generations, triggered in him the need to create a bridge between tango tradition and the XXI century.

''In the milongas it was tango, but outside them, the Trip Hop of groups such as Massive Attack, Portishead, Cibo Matto, Morcheeba, Bjork, gave birth to an impulse to dance tango, as intense, dense and erotic as Osvaldo Pugliese´s tango '

For this reason and as this experience developed little by little while he finished composing his first cd Aldea Global in September 2001, with some tangos composed by him and some genre classics, he decided to include in this CD, his first two tracks of Electronic Tango: Trance Tango (based on the Duo de Amor by Astor Piazzolla), and a rioplatense electronic version of Mi Buenos Aires Querido.

In August 2003, released the cd NARCOTANGO, with completely original music where electronics and tango melt definitively. At this launching, Libedinsky wrote:

NARCOTANGO is a deep embrace between tango and the electronic musical atmosphere of our times.

"When a few couples are still at the dancing floor, and magic visits the milonga, when bodies exhausted after having danced for hours, refuse to put and end to the evening, it is then when NARCOTANGO was born.
At that moment I started to imagine the music I wanted to dance and see people dancing, at the time when the narcotic power of tango, confirms that once you have entered this universe, you are most unlikely to leave it, because tango is like a drug which creates an incredible, sensual and powerful addiction''

Narcotango, in a few months and exclusively by word of mouth (since it is an independent production), began to become well-known and danced in milongas all around the world. The genre was identified as ELECTRONIC TANGO, and shortly afterwards, record stores and other shops in the centre of the city of Buenos Aires, at Corrientes, Florida and Santa Fe streets, played it to give music to city everyday life.

NARCOTANGO then became part of the contemporary urban sound track.
Other groups that accompanied this process in the city of Buenos Aires were: Bajofondo Tango Club, Tanghetto, Ultratango, and later Otros Aires, San Telmo Lounge.
Gotan Project, which had been a success in Europe and EEUU, was not well known in Argentina, because curiously its cd La Revancha del Tango, was not edited in the country until 2006.

As from the release of the cd, concerts in Argentina and international tours began, mainly to Europe.

Journalist Carlos Iglesias wrote in September 2003
''...Narcotango´s entourage is sensitive and passionate, and traditional instruments let their old airs go to melt with the air that is breathed nowadays. A creative and disturbing cd, impossible not to be trapped by the addictive sounds that emerge from its songs...''

At the same time, confrontations and controversies arose regarding the legitimacy and fashion of the genre, between advocates and detractors, who engaged in endless social and cultural discussions, with passion and intensity and very frequently big amounts of aggression.

In May 2006, NARCOTANGO 2 is released.
The path marked by the first NARCOTANGO, created a great expectation for this second work:

Tango is burning
with passion, coexisting, struggling
and creating new ways of expression
in music and dance, like a delicate heartbeat
intimately tied to its roots, dramatically
and happily seduced by the present.

Tango is ardent
and leaves a strong impression on our senses
in every spot of the world. It is moving to be here to live it.

The entire world echoed this new trend, named tango electronico or neo tango which took the roots of tango and made it a contemporary means of expression. It was no longer referred to as a renaissance, but as a new creation, fresh, and deeply settled in history.

Diario Corriere 5. Italy. May 2007
... ''Narcotango has created a new, modern music, contaminating the sounds associated to traditional tango with electronic music. A winding, erotic music with elegant intermezzos and a heart beating the flavour of the sounds of Buenos Aires...''

Magazine Revista XXIII. Buenos Aires, Argentina. January 2007
...´´ Narcotango 2 is full of tense movie-like moments, climax and endings which receive applause even from machines. Libedinsky´s merit is to have found a place where apparently conflicting sounds mutually enrich. ´´... (Martín Mazzini)

Estereofonica magazine Colombia. September 2006
''...Narcotango 2, is a modern record which reflects the spirit of Buenos Aires as a city which respects tango as a genre and brilliantly joins every artistic expression into a single musical concept.
It is moving because it keeps the traditional essence of tango and very subtly connects us with the contemporary world. It is a record that can be danced at a milonga or at a disco, as was the case in Colombia last first of June. The live show is simply stunning ...''
(Luisa Piñeros)

Platomania. Music web site -Holland. September 2006
´´... Libedinsky has the ability to program his computer in a way that gets on well with the performances of the bandoneon and the violin. Tango melancholy is preserved and you can dance to it...´´
(Ruud Verkerk)

TangoKultur Magazin. Germany. August 2006
...Narcotango developed their music very positively. Everything seems more defined and arranged. The second Album is a wonderful composition of songs for dancing, or just for listening and enjoying...

 

NARCOTANGO en VIVO, the first dvd and cd of the group, recorded in the Bolivar Theatre in the city of Quito, Ecuador in September 2007, released in July 2008, always by the independent record label TADEMUS, is the consolidation of Narcotango´s concept, which, even if it uses electronics in its production, includes it as another instrument and not as the music central axis.
The music of Narcotango has been choreographed by leading dancers from Argentina:
Iñaki Urlezaga ballet for his work:''The day that an Angel arrived to Buenos Aires ''(2007).
Maximiliano Guerra, for his Ballet 2 X DANZA.

NARCOTANGO en VIVO, CD and DVD, has been nominated for the Gardel Awards 2009 as the best album of electronic tango, and Latin Grammy 09 for best tango album.

Specialized critics have praised NARCOTANGO´s performance

Newspaper El Comercio Quito Ecuador. September 2007
``...Around 10 pm, people left Bolivar Theatre in the centre of Quito completely moved. Some of them were still singing melodies and some others, a bit more audacious, drew, with restless paces, some dancing movements on the paving stones of Chile Street.
The reason? An excellent performance that moved deeply those who attended the show of the Argentine group Narcotango...´

Magazine El Tangauta. Buenos Aires, August 2007. COVER COLUMN
... Prejudices tumble down vis a vis the power and originality of Narcotango´s music. While omnipresent, electronic resources respect the taste for the traditional melody that has always been characteristic of tango ) (Carlos Bevilacqua)

During 2008 and 2009, Carlos Libedinsky (Bandoneon and Music Director), Fernando del Castillo (Drums, Percussion, and Samplers), Marcelo Toth (Guitars, Bass Guitar, and Samplers), Mariano Castro (Piano, Keyboards, Bass Guitar, and Samplers), develop a deep artistic connection and begin to compose as a group. As a result of this experience, they create their new album LIMANUEVA, 3rd CD of the group recorded in February 2010. LIMANUEVA is edited in April 2010, and is also the starting point of a world tour that in 2010 and 2011 will showcase Narcotango in the main cities of America and Europe.

LIMANUEVA was moninated for the LATIN GRAMMY AWARDS 2010; as best Tango album.

In 2011, Narcotango composed the soundtrack of the film WYGRANY , of the filmmaker Wieslaw Saniewszki

In 2013 Narcotango released their 5th CD "Cuenco", which was performed live in concerts in more than 20 cities of Europe and America during 2013 and 2014.

The "Cuenco Tour" presented its last show on December 10, 2014 in the Golden Hall of the Buenos Aires city Legislative builiding. In that occasion, Carlos Libedinsky, Fernando del Castillo, Marcelo Toth, and Mariano Castro, members of the group Narcotango, were officially nominated as "Distinguished Personalities of the Argentinean Culture".

NARCOTANGO has consolidated, as a major reference of the tango new musical and culture expresion, performing in the most important halls, theaters and festivals of America and Europe, in 30 international tours since 2004 untill now (February 2015)

BACK