Maná puts Festival La Onda on the map
EDITOR’S NOTE: SFMusica’s Julio Lara contributed to the San Francisco Chronicle’s coverage of Festival La Onda. Below is his full review of Sunday’s performance.
Maná, the iconic Mexican pop rock band, has roots dating back to 1981 when they were known as Sombrero Verde before officially becoming Maná in 1987.
They’ve sold out arenas and stadiums. Headlining festivals isn’t new to them. They’ve set domestic and international capacity records. Every time the band hits the road, you can read stories of them accomplishing feats no other Latino band ever has. They’ve been rolling this way for more than 40 years.
And yet, after successful showings in Napa during the BottleRock Festival and Festival La Onda, they’ve yet again done something no other Latin band has ever done — headline an anglo-booked card and a latino-booked one in back-to-back weeks.
Forty years in and the quartet from Guadalajara, Mexico continues to operate in a whole other stratosphere.
Because there is a world where, when the lineup for the inaugural Festival La Onda dropped and people saw Maná at the top of the billing, some people thought “eh, I’ve seen them once, I’ve seen them a thousand times,” or “weren’t they just at BottleRock? Why would I see them again?”
But credit the organizers of Festival La Onda who blocked out that noise and instead knew one very important thing about creating their inaugural lineup: If you want to be considered a serious Latino music festival, you have to book a serious band to headline.
And judging by the size of the crowd at the La Onda stage, Maná is still, 40 years into their careers, the most serious band out there.
It was a watershed weekend for the legends of pop rock as they culminated a two-week festival stay in Napa. They performed near the top of the billing for last weekend’s BottleRock festival and by most accounts gave a transcendent performance on Day 2.
But unlike their 5:45 p.m. booking for BottleRock that was followed by Pearl Jam, there was no question who the masses had come to see at La Onda, with the spotlight and crowd the biggest for Maná on the festival’s final day despite some more modern, ultra popular acts at the top of the bill in Fuerza Regida and Junior H and other legends of Latin music like Alejandro Fernandez sharing the same sized-font on the poster.
The true beauty of it all is that there were no surprises to the Maná set to close out the festival. There never are any surprises. The formula Maná used at La Onda is the same they’ve been using for decades — simply play smash hit after smash hit that crashes like waves of nostalgia for the sea of adoring fans.
“Manda una señal?” Check.
“Corazón Espinado?” Check.
“Oye Mi Amor.” Of course.
“Mariposa Traicionera” sung by thousands to fill the night sky? Absolutely.
And there lies Maná’s super power, their gift: their music transcends time like no Latin band in history. Maná hasn’t dropped new music since 2015’s “Cama Incendiada” and the songs mentioned above date back to 1992. On Sunday, Maná even dipped into songs from 1990’s “Falta Amor” — their second studio album.
Yet somehow, the old feels brand new. It’s not that Maná hits different every time. But they hit like the first time every time. There is no other way to explain it.
While the crowd filled about half of the grounds at the La Onda stage to begin their set, some 20 minutes in, the mass of people flocking over from the Verizon Stage where the more hip, more modern, Fuerza Regida was performing to catch Maná perform was noticeable. It didn’t take very long after that for the entire field to fill to capacity.
By the time the bass riff for “Me Vale” hit, the crowd was shoulder-to-shoulder. It stayed that way until 9:35 p.m. when Maná stopped playing.
Maná’s successful run in back-to-back weeks, but especially at Festival La Onda, must have been music to Latitude 38’s ears. So much so that no more than 30 minutes after Maná finished their set, tickets went on sale for Festival La Onda in 2025.
Talk about accomplishing feats never done before by other Latino bands. You can now add “put Festival La Onda firmly on the map” to Maná’s resume.