Chuck Prophet, the old rocker who was saved by cumbia

During the worst days of his life, as he waited with poisonous uncertainty to find out the severity of his cancer, Chuck Prophet, 61, could only distract himself with the records in his vinyl collection. During those 14 days, the albums by Bob Dylan, Neil Young, The Clash, The Band and many others from his extensive collection took on a new importance; but, unexpectedly, he also connected with a record of cumbia hits. “I didn’t know anything about this genre,” the singer and composer confesses via video call from his home in California. “Suddenly, my body was hankering for something like that.”

After two weeks, the doctors informed him that he had a treatable lymphoma, and he breathed a sigh of relief. But his body was still craving that folkloric sound he had heard, as varied and rich as all the Latin and Caribbean communities where it developed. And so, sick with cancer and with chemotherapy ahead of him, cumbia came into his life, and left a mark on his new album, Wake The Dead (Everlasting), which is a significant departure from the classic and alternative rock of which Prophet is such a good representative. The California native and first-rate composer of the underground scene was the leader of Green On Red, a band that, together with The Long Ryders and Dream Syndicate, helped to open a great path in the late 1980s known as New American Rock.

“Cumbia only asks you to get out of bed,” he explains. “It is not the music that an old Anglo man like me usually listens to, the music that I would listen to if I had to live in a closed room. Music contained in albums like Third by Big Star; Blue by Joni Mitchell; or Tonight’s the Night by Neil Young. Very introspective music.”

I didn’t know anything about this genre, but my body was hankering for something like that. Cumbia just asks you to get out of bed

Chuck Prophet

While undergoing chemotherapy, Prophet thought he would never make another album in his life. However, the energy of cumbia led him to overcome his fears, even more so when, as a new fan of the genre, he met a band in Salinas that fascinated him: ¿Qiensave? “It’s a band that comes from a Mexican family of nine siblings. When we played together at a festival a couple of years ago in Southern California, they were all dancing with the audience. That reminded me of the early days of punk rock,” says the musician. “I really liked it. When I started playing, I started as a fan. I went to some punk rock concerts in San Francisco. There, I saw Dead Kennedys when I was very young. There was a moment in that concert when there was no line of separation between the audience and the stage. Everything was one. That’s what punk was about. The audience and the musicians dressed the same and could express themselves the same way they looked.” Cumbia offers the same unifying power as punk, according to Prophet, and in this case, it is a music that came from the town of Salinas, “a forgotten part of California, the country of John Steinbeck,” where the most needy helped each other in a community.

Wake The Dead is an eclectic album in which this musician with the talent of creating fast-paced rock songs manages to unite rock with cumbia and disparate sounds, offering a broader and more danceable palette. He does it like his admired The Clash, the most restless and exploratory punk rock band of all time. “I spent a lot of time in my life listening to The Clash. Especially the album London Calling. It is a masterpiece. That album was a kind of drug that served as a bridge to a philosophy,” he says. “If the message of punk was that anyone could get an instrument and start a band, with The Clash and that album the message was that, once you put that band together, you could play any kind of music, no matter where your inspiration came from. It’s the same thing with my album and cumbia.”

His cancer is “100% over” after a year of treatment, he says. “I’ve changed as a person, I think I’m a little bit nicer now,” he confesses. He also has many more records in his possession. Getting over the disease has made him realize that he wants to have a better collection. He moves the camera and shows some albums. His latest acquisitions are the new works by Los Destellos, “a great band from Peru,” Ezra Furman and Los Hijos del Sol. Bob Dylan is also there, seen in a painting hanging in the room. “I love Bob Dylan,” he says. “He gives me peace of mind, he always gives me more than I ask for. For example, the other day I saw a video in which he was playing percussion with the microphone with a wrench and it was a joy to behold. I love this old Bob with all his records. The other day, I was listening to Modern Times and I stopped at Thunder on the Mountain. I was sitting there, all alone, thinking: ‘What is this?’ It’s the English language at its best, and it’s also a blues song. How exciting.”

Is there a rock band taking over the crown? “There’s always talk about streaming music killing musicians. But I see a lot of people walking around with headphones in their ears. They’re all listening to music! Maybe the guitar isn’t in those ears like it used to be, but I’m not worried. The interesting thing is to get an idea of what a singer should seem like. Should he be like James Taylor, Townes Van Zandt or Guy Clark just because he’s a guy singing about a certain America with an acoustic guitar? Does that mean Peaches couldn’t be that too? There are all kinds of musicians because there are so many different styles, and I like all the different ones.”

Chuck Prophet laughs loudly and speaks passionately. Cancer is now history and, from the living room of his house, he can be seen surrounded by records. The man who was changed by the disease leaves one last thought out there before saying goodbye: “If you get up in the morning and you are interested in what you do, I think you are a lucky person. You have to find something that interests you. Whether it is music, Bob Dylan, family, work… I have learned that. And I consider myself a lucky person. I swear it.”

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition