Inspector: 3 decades of Mexican ska; A bitter goodbye? No way!

Before the tours, the albums , the packed concerts , and the interviews, Inspector was just a group of friends from Monterrey, a random afternoon, and the youthful impulse to make noise. No method, no plan, no calculation . Just the desire to play , to improvise, to have fun . Sometimes great projects don't start out as such: they appear as a joke that becomes a habit and ends up being destiny .

The band started as a party among friends. A few beers, a crazy instrument, and everyone would join in. One would say, 'Come on, sing a little.' Another would grab the guitar and sing a line. That's how we started. At the time, we didn't think this would be a lifestyle," Big Javy, the band's vocalist, recalls to Excélsior.

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But there was a turning point . A moment when the party stopped being just that . It was when they played for the first time in front of a real audience, when the songs were no longer just theirs , but began to have an impact on others .

"We realized that people liked what we were doing. I joined the band and there were five songs. I started singing them and people reacted, responded. I stayed. And that was 30 years ago, man," he recalls.

The path, however, wasn't always upward . Between the stages and applause , there were also moments of silence , moments where the music seemed to be insufficient to sustain them. One such episode occurred in 2009 , when the Mexican music industry was going through one of its worst crises .

That was a really difficult time. People weren't going to concerts anymore, they weren't buying records, there was no room to play. I spoke to the band and said, 'I think it's time to retire.' I told them I was leaving anyway, and they could continue if they wanted. But they said, 'We're just going to record one more album.' And that album was Ska a la Carta . For me, it was the toughest decision of my life: to continue or to dedicate myself to something else. I bet everything on continuing. And it was the best decision," says Big Javi.

That album didn't just rescue them: it catapulted them . It marked the beginning of a new era for Inspector. They toured again and found a new audience—more diverse, broader, and, above all, loyal.

Over the years, we've found ways to make our music resonate with people. That's been passed down from generation to generation. Now our audiences are all kinds.

"There are people who listen to regional Mexican music, pop, rock, and they also listen to Inspector. That's helped us grow a lot, even internationally," the performer explains.

EVERYTHING HAS A PRICE

But professional growth came with personal losses . Being on Inspector wasn't a job; it was a commitment that demanded more than time. It demanded life.

From the beginning, the hardest part was that we couldn't make a living from music. We had jobs and lost them all the time. I've been through two divorces because of this. You don't put the same amount of dedication into a relationship. You miss birthdays, parties, friends... a lot of things that never come back. You learn to live with that. Now, for example, I travel with my wife. I've made a lot of mistakes and I don't want another divorce. I told myself, 'I'd better bring her with me.' And that's what we do," he describes.

The wear and tear wasn't just emotional , it also involved adapting to a changing industry , to new processes, at a different speed, but they knew how to do it without losing the essential.

Before, recording a song would take two or three days. Now you can record three in one day. Technology makes it much easier. But at Inspector, we try to keep it as natural as possible. We don't overuse technology, because the most important thing is to convey it. People can tell when something is done without soul. And they can also tell when something is truly felt. And that's what we strive for: to feel it."

Now that they're celebrating 30 years , they're doing so with a new album: Snakes and Ladders , a title that functions as both a metaphor and a mirror. Rise, fall, rise again—that's something that, like any band , Inspector has also experienced.

The title says it all. That's how this journey is. Sometimes you're up, sometimes you're down. The songs reflect the very moment we're living. The everyday, the real. There's no fiction, there's a memory of everything we've experienced, and we capture it there," he explains, sipping on a beer.

But if anything has sustained Inspector beyond the rhythm, it's the ideology. Ska, for them, isn't just music . It's identity . This message takes on even greater force in a world where hate speech seems to be increasingly normalized.

Ska is the main genre that combats racism. It's the only one that carries that message of unity. It fights against all the atrocities in the world. That's why we do it with so much pride. That's why we respectfully carry the flag of Free SKA America.

This June 21st , when the Mexico City Arena welcomes them, it won't just be a celebration of songs , it will be the confirmation that 30 years later there are sounds that don't age because they were never in fashion.

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