With its TRIBAL 2025 compilation, the NAAFI label marks a new chapter for Mexican Tribal
TRIBAL 2025, the new compilation from legendary Mexican label NAAFI (and its 100th release!), marks the return of a sound that profoundly transformed the history of Latin American electronic music. Born in the early 2000s, Mexican Tribal fused coastal percussion, pre-Hispanic heritage and regional sounds with the power of global electronic music. From Monterrey to the State of Mexico via the Costa Chica, this genre has left a lasting mark on dance floors and the cultural identity of an entire generation of producers.
TRIBAL 2025: a vision for the future
In 2014, NAAFI had already taken a major step forward with a seminal three-volume compilation, each volume dedicated to a tribal genre and an iconic artist:
- Tribal prehispánico — DJ Javier Estrada
- Tribal guarachero — Alan Rosales
- Tribal costeño — DJ Tetris
Couvre x Chefs participated in the launch conference for this now legendary release and published an article accompanied by an interview with key members of the label, Mexican Jihad and Fausto Bahia.
Today, TRIBAL 2025 does not continue this chapter: it opens a new one. More than ten years after NAAFI helped put tribal music on the global club music map, TRIBAL 2025 rejects nostalgia. The compilation highlights the raw power of the genre — its distinctive rhythms, communal energy and cultural depth — while confronting it with contemporary sound experimentation and new ways of thinking about the club.
An intergenerational scene brought together
The strength of TRIBAL 2025 lies in its line-up. Between pioneers, the new generation, more underground artists and others who tour internationally regularly, the compilation has brought together a host of artists who demonstrate how tribal music remains a constantly evolving musical language: Clap Freckles, Lao, El Chuico Callado, Siete Catorce, Debit, Zutzut, Ezya, Sandunga, Ruido con H, DNZA, Syztema, Entrañas, Dj Weed, Homie Luna, Underwght, Ozomatecuhtli, Cler., WTTLC, Dj Fucci, El Irreal Veintiuno and HMR.
What is interesting is that not all of the artists featured on TRIBAL 2025 are necessarily known for being particularly prolific producers of tribal music. This encounter between essential purists of the genre and more experimental artists who have devoted themselves to producing a tribal track offers a wonderful diversity that reminds us that tribal music does not evolve around a single aesthetic but as a collective construction, nourished by multiple trajectories and contrasting visions.
Exclusive focus: a preview of a new track by Sandunga
Among the most notable contributions to the NAAFI compilation, that of producer and DJ Sandunga occupies a unique place. Her track ‘Los Aluxes’, revealed exclusively via Couvre x Chefs in this article, accurately illustrates the tension between heritage and modernity that runs through TRIBAL 2025. A real gem, the track is mainly reminiscent of Tribal Prehispánico through its use of organic or ancestral sounds (flutes, drums), mystical vocals and a name that refers to a kind of elf from Mayan mythology. The track also incorporates electronic layers and, at times, the bass line of the guaracha, opening up the possibilities of a revisited pre-Hispanic (or ethnic?) tribal sound.
Originally from Cholula de Rivadavia in the state of Puebla, Sandunga has been developing a hybrid aesthetic for several years: she emulates native and folk sounds from different cultures, which she fuses with percussive and urban atmospheres. By varying the tempos, she creates timeless soundscapes that defy traditional club classifications.
Her discography reflects this approach, whether through her EPs on WVWV and Ten Toes Turbo or his contributions to compilations by Santa Sede and cvjv negrv records. Her track on TRIBAL 2025 stands out as a statement: tribal music can mutate, absorb experimental influences and remain rooted in Mexican identity.
A release that comes amid renewed global interest
TRIBAL 2025 reaffirms that Mexican Tribal is neither a memory nor a cyclical fashion. It is a creative, cultural and community force capable of continuing to shape the club of tomorrow. While NAAFI’s first compilation in 2014 helped to structure the genre, TRIBAL 2025 is now redefining its horizons. Mexican tribal is not making a comeback: it is moving forward.
This release comes at a key moment. Mexican Tribal has recently enjoyed renewed international appeal, driven in part by Rosa Pistola‘s promotion and spotlighting of the genre, whose work has put tribal back at the centre of the global club scene. At the same time, the recent reformation of the trio 3ball MTY, the most publicised figure of the tribal explosion between 2010 and 2012 — notably marked by an appearance at Coachella — and their successful tour of the United States, signals the symbolic importance of this return of the genre. We could also mention Zutzut‘s latest EP (Altar, NAAFI, 2025), which features tracks incorporating the emblematic tribal rhythm, or the return of another prodigy from Monterrey, Alfonso Luna, who has just released a new EP, Neolitico, on the Argentine label Rebote. In this context of renewed interest, TRIBAL 2025 does not seek to capitalise on a revival, but rather to redefine the future of tribal in the contemporary club scene.
Artwork: Espejo de Obsidiana by mexicanjihad & co with logo by ZOMBRA (2025)
Curator & Selector: Pablo Ramirez (Dj Fucci)
Mastering: Imaabs at Modos Studios
Pre-order TRIBAL 2025 on Bandcamp, coming to NAAFI on 2nd December..
