MTV Makes an Old Band New Again - Menudo

Ok, kiddies… Many of you in this current “MTV Generation” (you know - the one where MTV doesn’t play ANY music and just has, like, a bazillion reality shows), let me tell you a little something about a lil’ group called Menudo.  Yes, Menudo.  It was one of the originial boy bands, long before the likes of New Kids on the Block (also before your time, but bear with me) and N’Sync.  Have you ever heard of Ricky Martin?  Well, he started out there.  The group was essentially a revolving door of Hispanic hotties that were replaced once they were deemed to old to remain heartthrobs.  Well, MTV’s bringing them back, reality TV style for their new bilingual channel- MTV Tr3s.

Guillermo Arriaga was a just a kid in Mexico when he was swept up in one of the biggest pop-music crazes of all time: Menudo mania.

Menudo was the boy band, an early ’80s Hispanic precursor to groups such as ‘NSync and Backstreet Boys, and served as the farm team for Puerto Rican superstar Ricky Martin, an original member of the teen-pop sensation.

The group sparked dreams of romance in girls and dreams of stardom in boys such as Arriaga, now 39. But the immigrant carpenter and amateur songwriter knew it was unlikely he would be discovered in his home state of Michoacan, not exactly a stop on the road to Hollywood.

Last week, Hollywood came to Arriaga’s Los Angeles County barrio looking for stars in his own back yard.

Menudo is being revived by MTV, and the call went out for bilingual Hispanic teens to audition for the new band. The first casting session was held at a Hispanic shopping mall in Lynwood with a colonial architectural theme that must remind Arriaga of home.

The man may have missed his chance the first time around, but now his 15-year-old son, also named Guillermo, had a shot at the same dream. Father and son made the short trip from their nearby South Gate home and got in line. Guillermo wore a No. 13 and an oversize black T-shirt that draped below his knees. He gave a brief performance before a three-judge panel that included singer Frankie J and high-powered manager Johnny Wright (Backstreet Boys, ‘NSync, Janet Jackson, Justin Timberlake). Backstage, he answered questions for MTV Tr3s, the network’s new bilingual channel, which is filming the selection process for a reality series titled “Road to Menudo,” to begin airing May 12.

Guillermo was one of about 50 aspiring singers who participated in the Los Angeles-area tryouts. Auditions are continuing through the month, with stops in Miami, Dallas and New York. Once winnowed to five band members, the new Menudo will appear this fall on the main MTV network in yet another reality series co-produced by Reveille, the Los Angeles-based company that specializes in importing successful foreign concepts for domestic TV, notably “Ugly Betty” and “The Office.” Viewers will watch the band coalesce, rehearse and record their first album.

“He might make it,” Arriaga Sr. said, putting his arm around his son. “You never know.”

As for his motivation, the teenager said, simply, “I want to become something.”

So is the world ready for another Menudo after a quarter-century? The world is still full of girls with the inclination to swoon, boys with the desire to be swooned over and adults with the compulsion to exploit the combustible combination of the two.

The show is a piece of MTV’s overall strategy of reaching that elusive but coveted demographic — the bilingual Hispanic kid in the United States who switches between cultures but thinks Univision is for his parents, which is not cool.

“Any company in the youth business needs a Hispanic strategy to survive, because Latinos are fueling the overall growth in the youth market,” says Ballas-Traynor, a former Univision executive. “It’s a top priority.”

Source: LA Times via HispanicBusiness.com