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Creativity springs from musician Stefan Gonzalez's Oak Cliff roots 

Man enters stage left. He is holding two coils in one hand, a pair of drumsticks in the other. The lights are dim because we are in that kind of venue.

Man crouches to the floor where a microphone waits. Gently, he brings the microphone to his mouth while clutching the stick with equal ferocity. The coil is placed in front of him where he lurches over it as predator. Then, where silence once stood, noise bellows from the fourth and fifth rings of hell.

Screeches, steel and saliva cover the audience like a warm blanket.

By the time Stefan Gonzalez is finished exorcising his demons, the audience is left to pick up the pieces of their egos off the beer-stained floor like ashed cigarette butts.

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Orgullo Primitivo is the name of this performative ritual, what others call a musical project. As a drummer and percussionist, Gonzalez charges each performance with the vulnerability of performance artist Vito Acconci and the brutality of Lydia Lunch.

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With a background in free jazz and experimental music, Gonzalez, 30, comes from a family of diverse and progressive musicians. He and his father and brother, Dennis and Aaron Gonzalez comprise what might be the most important musician family in Dallas. Together they form Yells at Eels, an abstract jazz trio from the barrios of Oak Cliff, where the Gonzalez brothers grew up.

"Back then we knew all our neighbors and we all had each other's backs," Stefan says. "Growing there, then, was pretty peaceful. Even though it was the relatively nice part of Oak Cliff, it was just mere blocks away from the gang-anger trend, with random drive-by shootings happening rampantly during the late '80s, mid-'90s."

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Stefan Gonzalez
Stefan Gonzalez(Jae S. Lee / Staff Photographer)

In the days long before boutiques, coffee shops, and bougie French restaurants, Oak Cliff was just Oak Cliff. Within that terrain existed violence of Wild West proportions. Rival gangs fought for relevancy. Machismo was the law of the land.

"If there is one benefit from the development of Oak Cliff, it's that it's much more peaceful and not prone to so much violence. Now I walk down the street I get the cops called on me because I look strange and menacing to people. When back in the day I would get harassed by cholos," Stefan says.

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"Now the tables have turned. So weird how it's changed. Now people put up walls and people don't know each other like they used to. When someone would move to the neighborhood my mom would bake them something and have me and my brother bring it to them. Now my parents are the witchy ones on the block."

Yet, as exists in most predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods, family was law.

"Even though my father didn't teach me Spanish, I decided to get into on my own. Punk rock from Latin America, Mexico, the island, and South and Central America during the '90s when there was more of a political end to the punk rock stuff. There were multiple translations of lyrics so I would compare the English translations to the Spanish lyrics.

"I would also write pen pals from across the world, trading music I was doing with [my band] Akkolyte for records of them. That's kind of how I learned how to speak Spanish, my obsession with obscure punk rock from Latin America. It was about getting back in touch with a part of myself that was lost, growing up, how I grew up."

Stefan Gonzalez
Stefan Gonzalez(Jae S. Lee / Staff Photographer)

Gonzalez remembers musicians from across the globe coming in and out of the house to practice and hang with his father, a trumpeter who has played with luminaries such Olu Dara, Roy Campbell Jr., Roy Hargrove and Max Roach.

"As far as the work ethic is concerned, if I don't feel like I have something planned in the next few days to play something, I feel like I'm not going about it the right way," Stefan says. "Because my dad was constantly working on the next record and always had all sorts of musicians coming in and out the house whether it was local bands or musicians from Chicago, Slovenia ... it was a constant assault, but it seemed so normal to me.

"He never pushed music on me, it was just a part of my life."

Gonzalez expands his practice to include curating, programming the best weekly showcase in Dallas with his Outward Bound Mixtape Sessions at the Deep Ellum club RBC (it stands for Rhythm, Beats, Culture). The Monday night survey has become a meeting place for creatives in the city to experiment with sounds and performance, collaborate and do some networking.

Gonzalez has become a pillar of the community. Along with the weekly mixtape event, he teaches drumming lessons to young people from Oak Cliff. He plays in bands including Yells at Eels, Unconscious Collective (with his brother Aaron and guitarist Gregg Prickett), Young Mothers (who tour globally), the grindcore band Akkolyte (also with his brother) and the aforementioned solo project, Orgullo Primitivo.

Their father's free jazz and avant-garde influences played an integral part in the development of sounds and identity for the brothers, as did a life growing up in church due to their mom's faith. All added a level of gravitas to Stefan's discovery of drums. "You can't take the church out of it, you can't take the jazz out of it."

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Stefan found a stored-away drum kit from the '70s that he would use to practice, later receiving tips from his father's friends to expand his understanding of sounds produced. It's difficult to prepare someone to witness a performance by Gonzalez.

He claims he doesn't work within a "academic level"; instead, it's "all on feeling." There is a level of uncertainty, a line that teeters between violence and peace. Each performance is a distillation of the daily, perhaps constant threats of emotional disruption of understanding, love and faith.

"Even though all of my music is over the top in one way or another, it still has facets just like people. We're very complicated. I don't wanna play one thing with just one specific band.

"It might be overwhelming to myself, but it's very important to show there's so many different layers and so many things we are capable of doing."

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Gonzalez navigates life as a creature in pursuit of the poetry of empathy.

"You gotta treat every performance like you're gonna die on stage. It might be the last time you get to express yourself, so you need to do it as intensely as possible."

By Lee Escobedo, Special Contributor