Los Angeles punk icon Alice Bag is honoring her Mexican roots with a cover of “Los Peces En El Rio.” The song is a traditional Christmas carol from Spain, though it’s largely unknown outside of that country and Spanish speaking Latin America. The cover is available on Bandcamp and features Alice Bag on vocals and percussion, Peter Atenoff on guitars, Daoud Coleman on doumbek darbuka and backing vocals, Paul Perez on bass and Teresa Covarrubias on backing vocals. The song tells the tale of Jesus being born from the perspective of fish that drink and drink and drink to see God be born.
Alice Bag is known for her contributions to the first wave of punk rock, which dominated the Los Angeles scene for years before hardcore invaded. She fronted the Bags, who existed from 1977 to 1981 and released music on Dangerhouse Records.
More recently she had been releasing music under her own name. She released her comeback album in 2016 with a self-titled record. It’s been followed up by Blueprint in 2018 and this year’s excellent Sister Dynamite. She’s released singles for songs like “Spark,” “Breadcrumbs,” “Sister Dynamite” and “77”
We also caught Alice Bag’s 2018 live set a few years ago at the Levitt Pavilion in Central Los Angeles. She played songs like “Babylonian Gorgon” and “Gluttony” from the Bags as well as a slew of her own songs like “No Means No” and “77.”
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