Ray Ricky Rivera is an artist for all ages. Born and raised in East Los Angeles, Ray has been playing and studying music since he was five years old. His musical influences range from contemporary artists to some of music’s most legendary performers. His passion and talent has taken him from his early days of creating tracks in a friend’s house to performing on the world stage. He describes his style as “a little bit of Hip Hop, a little bit Latin, a little bit Soul and a whole lotta love.”
Rivera got his start in the music business in 1998 as an emcee for the Latin ensemble, East LA Sabor Factory. An instant hit in the LA underground music scene, the band was nominated by LA Weekly for “Best L.A. Based Latin Band.” Rivera’s creativity and love for music propelled him to co-found the Latin Hip Hop group, Inner City Soul, in 2003. He traveled around the world, spreading his music to such interesting places as Germany, Bosnia, Kosovo and Cuba.
In his first solo project, Neighborhood Fame, Rivera pulls together his music and life experiences to create a fluid sound that combines bilingual hip-hop lyrics with salsa and cumbia rhythms. The album, released on April 3, 2007 on Triumphant Records, is drenched with an explosive energy that can only come from a developed artist who has spent many years on the stage and in the studio. His brother, up and coming turntablist, “DJ Abomb”, is featured on the album. The first single from Rivera’s debut album, “Mi Sonido” (My Sound), is an infectious track that serves as a lyrical introduction to Rivera’s unique sound.
Rivera has shared the stage with groundbreaking performers such as Rage Against the Machine, Wyclef Jean, Los Lobos, Ozomatli, Dilated Peoples, and many more. He is a talented artist who draws from a varied spectrum of musical influences ranging from Stevie Wonder, Mos Def, and A Tribe Called Quest to Willie Colon, Hector Lavoe, and La Sonora Dinamita. With influences this varied, Rivera is sure to appeal to a vast array of music lovers of any age.
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