Last night at Prospect Park, Obie Bermudez, Cucu Diamante, and Rebel Diaz performed an evening of Spanish music as part of the Celebrate Brooklyn series. Rebel Diaz took the stage to kick off the festivities, as a slight mist gradually escalated into a torrential downpour. Rebel Diaz are a socially conscious Latino-American Hip-hop trio. Originally from Chicago, they currently reside in the South Bronx. In the words spoken between songs and in their lyrics, Rebel Diaz espouse left causes and political views calling for revolution and resistance. Unfortunately, their social leanings are poorly articulated and lack artfulness. Their beats alternate between American hip-hop, and Reggaeton production, and their lyrics alternate between Spanish and English. I do not speak Spanish well enough to comment on the Spanish lyrics, but in English their writing style is a relentless rant. Over beats including one which samples the miners' strike ballad “Which Side Are You On,” written by Florence Reese, Rebel Diaz displayed sophisticated internationalism, impressive passion, and energy. Overall, though, their words currently lack the level of witticism that would make their group stand out. Female MC Lah Tere displayed fantastic mastery of double time rapping, but I was not entirely impressed with the group.

Next up was Cuban singer Cucu Diamantes and her band. After being introduced by a Little Person, Diamantes took the stage wearing a garish pink sleeveless top, and what appeared to be a bathing suit bottom. A gay guy near me remarked that the over-the-top outfit made Diamantes look like a man in drag, an assessment I would have to concur with. Diamantes' band was large, well rehearsed, and talented playing smoothly over Afro Cuban rhythm on songs like “Burrito.” Even in the miserable weather, they got the crowd clapping in unison. Their performance was extremely theatrical with two dancers brought out at once point to pantomime the roles of puppet and puppet master and acrobatically land in sexually suggestive positions. Although they also had a social message-about gender roles and discrimination- the band's blend of gaudy flamboyance, and entertainment ability reminded me of an act that might have residency in a casino. The act even included some musical fusion, with Diamantes singing and rapping a Hip-hop influenced song that included a verse by two rappers. With her energy and bounce, Diamantes could have performed all night. Reluctantly, she left the stage at the behest of the Festival organizers to leave ample time for Obie Bermudez.

The show’s headliner Obie Bermudez took the stage with his five piece band, dressed casually in a baseball cap. Bermudez was born in Puerto Rico and his family moved to New Jersey when he was a child. Bermudez writes and sings in Spanish, and he's a Latin pop sensation. He can play any number of styles, but yesterday he played upbeat radio friendly pop rock. Bermudez has produced four CD's: Locales, Confesiones, Todo El Ano, and Lo que Trajo el Barko. His loud, masculine, but searing and romantic voice served him well on the big chorused rock songs he performed. Bermudez is an intense, handsome singer with a confident strut. His first love was poetry, and his songwriting mainly concerns the pleasures and problems of love. Because he sings in Spanish, Bermudez is frequently compared only to fellow Latinos, but at times his style also resembled English language musicians like Dave Matthews. His music has a powerful, seductive sound. Even without being able to understand every word, I left fully entertained.

I'm not really sure exactly what it is that I saw going on at this show.

The night started off on kind of a sour note because the F train seemed to take double the time that it usually does to get to where it needs to go. It was over-crowded, we stood the whole time, and the AC didn't really seem like it was working. Welcome to MTA, right? To top it off -- when I arrived at the show with three friends in tow, I couldn't find Nick and we were in the middle of a torrential downpour. I tried in vain to stay dry with an umbrella and towels. Really, it was a valiant effort -- my friends did a much better job of it than I did, because we chose some chairs in the near-empty venue and within 5 minutes I'd given up, handed off my umbrella, and started running around in the water; I took my shoes off and just had fun with it.

It was the Bud Light Latin Music Series night at the bandshell, which I didn't realise but turned out to be a really great thing. Rebel Diaz was the right kind of first act to have on stage for that first kind of moment. I can't really speak to the quality of the music, but the DJ and three performers were a hell of a lot of fun to just dance around to. Rebel Diaz is an "activist hip-hop outfit" fronted by Lah Tere. They were energetic, loud, and most importantly: they were having fun on stage. It's always easier to get into the music when the performers themselves are having a good time with it. During the middle of they set they stopped -- like These United States -- to point out a huge rainbow that had formed during the middle of the storm (even though it hadn't stopped raining yet). By the end of their set I found Nick, and we got ready for the next act. Little did we know what we'd be seeing.

CuCu Diamantes was up next. To start -- when she walked on stage, she was wearing a pink silk bustier with blue underwear. That's it. And some heels, I suppose. More distracting than the lack of clothing was the fact that the blue underwear she had on had a tiger face printed over her crotch. My friends and I were already hooked -- even if we weren't going to like the music, we knew we were already pretty mesmerized. When we consulted our program, it told us that CuCu Diamantes is the frontwoman for a band called Yerba Buena, and she is an activist for many different causes: fighting AIDS and domestic violence against women. In between sets, she yelled out things that we should do. One of our favourites was, "EVERYONE IN THE CLOSET SHOULD COME OUT OF IT!" Her music was crazy. She perhaps chose a wrong opening number because it was too slow and kind of out of place for the night, but everything picked up pretty quickly after that. It says a lot that it was entertaining to me even though I couldn't understand the lyrics because everything was sung in Spanish -- but that might have just been because I was totally amazed by what was going on in front of me. At one point, she brought on two friends. That's where the night got out-of-hand awesome and weird. The two friends put on a show for the crowd as a supposed puppeteer and puppet (the male and female, respectively). What started innocently enough as a cute act quickly turned into what could have easily been described as a sex show. They were doing strength poses and body contortions in tandem and a lot of them ended up in poses that were pretty hilariously uncomfortable -- at one point, the guy's head was solidly planted in the girl's crotch as they switched positions (and even when they weren't really moving, too). At the very least, the entire act was really entertaining; whether that's in the way they wanted it to be or not, it left a very memorable impression.

Obie Bermúdez was the last act to come on stage. By then, the sky had darkened and the rain had mostly given up. Bermúdez is a Puerto Rican pop star who's won a Latin Grammy award. Musically, he's been compared to acts like Juanes, and I definitely see the comparison there. His voice was really smooth, full, and the band had a big sound while they totally rocked out. While I thought it was a little bit lacklustre compared to everything else that had happened on stage, it was nice -- less exhausting, calmer, and not at all shockingly fun. The only bad part of this set for me, aside from the fact that it was only so-so compared to the rest, was the fact that there was another inappropriate couple standing in front of us. I'm pretty sure that's just my luck with these large shows. But, hey -- if you can't have fun and feel the love on Latin Music Series night at Prospect Park, when can you?