Los Crudos handbills and posters.

The Los Crudos handbills and posters includes 21 handbills and 5 larger posters for the Los Crudos, an all-Latino punk band from Chicago that began in 1991. Most are xeroxed, with a few being offset printed.

Item, Folder number and/or title, Box number, Los Crudos handbills and posters, MSS 476, Special Collections, MSU Libraries, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI.

This collection is part of the José Treviño Chicano/Latino Activism Collections at MSU.

Los Crudos' music and reputation straddled both the straight edge and crusty punk scenes. The band began in 1991, in Chicago's predominantly Latino Pilsen neighborhood. The group's music was typical of the hardcore punk scene--short, fast and loud--with lyrics that focused on class, police brutality, homophobia and immigrant rights--all sung in Spanish. Many of the posters are for inexpensive (as little as $1) all-ages Chicago-area shows, many which forbid violence and drugs. Addresses of venues are listed, as is contact information for show organizers and promoters. The images themselves are mostly Xeroxed, with a few being offset printed. They exemplify the tendency in straightedge and anarcho-punk to appropriate violent images, and use violent names and aggressive music to transmit messages that denounce racial, sexual, systemic, physical and institutional violence. They feature images of hectic hardcore shows, heroes of the Mexican Revolution and icons of the Military-Industrial Complex--such as soldiers armed with assault rifles and gas masks--of which Los Crudos were so critical. They disbanded in 1998, but not before paving a trail for Chicanos and Latinos in what was a subculture dominated by Caucasian youth. C̃ollection description per vendor.