Background
Méndez was born in Valparaiso, Chile on 21 July 1975. His father was a political dissident, who left the country after the Chilean regime began monitoring him.
Méndez was born in Valparaiso, Chile on 21 July 1975. His father was a political dissident, who left the country after the Chilean regime began monitoring him.
He went to school in the Larsbodaskolan, in Farsta Strand, joined a gang and was small-time criminal, though he always had the goal of making it in showbusiness. After several run ins with the police, he focused on beginning his career. After joining a counseling institution called Fasta and meeting sound engineer Jordi Fuste, DJ Méndez started his career as a Latin rapper, making his live debut in a local festival.
Mixing hip-hop and traditional Latin American rhythms, and he was able to get a record deal, soon climbing charts in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, and even Russia with his first hit "Chiki-Chiki", featured in his debut album Latino for Life.
He had met the producer Robert Wåtz while working at Toys R United States The emerging interest for the Latin American music in Europe was one factor in the acceptance and music like this Chilean market as closed as the Scandinavian market, which until recently were only local artists and popular English-speaking.
Some of his songs like "Estocolmo", show-through a Latin song the attitude and opinion of Latin American migrants to lands so different from theirs as the Scandinavian countries. In March 2001 he visited his native country, carrying out a successful promotional tour.
His songs are in Chilean Spanish with a mixture of English, was produced in conjunction with the popular DJ"s Rob"n"Raz, have melodic choruses made by singers such as Emmanuel Contreras, Martin Thors, Pablo Javier Gonzalez Cepeda or (better known as Yei) choristers who were both in their studio recordings and in each of the live performances he does.
Today is one of the best representatives of Chilean rap and hip-hop and one of the Chilean artists with greater international influence. In 2009, Méndez is working in his upcoming album and the first single of the album titled "Lady" was recently released on radios in Chile.
He won the 2002 Music Television Video Music Awards Latinoamérica Awards for Best Southwest New Artist. Has accomplished many milestones and participated in several music festivals, highlighting 1 Award Music Television Video Music Awards Latinoamérica Awards and 1 Music Television Europe Music Awards, second place in Melodifestivalen Sweden 2002, the gull of gold in the Song Festival of Viña del March, participation in the famous festival Son Latinos in the Canary Islands, Spain with 350,000 people, a concert for more than 250,000 people in Red Square in Moscow, Russia, and participation to more than 100,000 people in Louisiana Pampilla of Coquimbo.
