Bufi’s superb Homeless Hero EP (2008) grabbed the 10th spot on our list of favorite EPs of the last decade, and we’re thrilled for the pop guru’s follow up. Artists don’t usually take three years to make the transition from EP pop aspirant to full-length recording artist, but, to be fair, Mateo González has kept himself pretty active lately. His band Neon Walrus keeps sparking interest, he’s been releasing one fantastic remix after another, and has recently taken on the leading role as the director/co-founder of the up-and-coming label, Rock Juvenil (Las Liebres, Lost Mapaches, Martinez). While we applaud González’s entrepreneurial ventures and his efforts at keeping momentum, we’re thrilled he’s coming back to give a much-deserved continuation to his most endearing project as Bufi.
Mexican contemporary disco label Electrique Music just released Bufi’s latest maxi-single, “Happy Robots,” and it’s pretty awesome. By now we all know Bufi’s fixation with sequencing and Italo-bass roots, and that’s ultimately what we get here. More restrained than his French counterparts (Breakbot, Kavinsky) and more revealing than his compatriots Rebolledo and Daniel Maloso, Bufi is surfing through some very deep and compelling ground. When the cute vocoders enounce “You crying? why, tell me why”, that comes off as both, demanding and whimsical. Bufi’s highly anticipated new album, Space Guapachoso, is expected to see the light later this year.