The Chilean band overcoming police violence with music

Camilo Galvez Bugueño lives in a small apartment on the 5th floor of a working class red high-rise building.

He’s in his late 20s.

His balcony looks out over train tracks and in the distance… snow-capped mountains

Beyond his city of Santiago, Chile. Up to the Andes.

Camilo writes words. Words of struggle. Words of resistance. Words of rabia, anger. Rage.

He used to work at a factory, driving vehicles. Moving product. 

Then came the estallido social — The social explosion.

October. 2019. 

Daily protests erupted over a hike in the cost of public transportation in Santiago. But the demonstrations quickly grew into more than that. Those in the streets demanded change — real change. They demanded more rights. They demanded a new Constitution.

Police cracked down with impunity. Videos went viral of riot police beating people in the streets. Chemical water guns. Shooting rubber bullets at point blank range. The number of the dead and wounded skyrocketed.

Dozens were killed. Thousands were hospitalized.

Camilo was one of them… after riot police shot him in the eye with a rubber bullet. He says he felt his eye explode like a squished grape.

He was not alone. Throughout the protests, which would ripple on for almost 6 months, Chilean state security forces would cause more than 400 eye injuries to protesters in the streets. 

Like Camilo, many people would never see out of those eyes again.

They were condemned to juggle work, life, home and family, with doctors, surgery, and therapists. To pay hospital costs for premeditated injuries intentionally caused by hostile police forces.  

Like Camilo, many of the injured and the partially blinded lost their jobs. They fell into depression. Some committed suicide.

But some of them also found each other… 

Camilo found others. Victims, like him, and…

They began to sew their lives back together, with music.

They call themselves, Hasta la Victory— Until Victory.

All of the members suffered injuries at the hands of Chilean security forces during the huge protests of 2019 and 2020.

Many wear patches to cover their empty sockets or their disfigured eyes. 

They sing about justice. About social change. 

About their companions that were killed by the police. People like Christian Valdebenito, a construction worker who died after he was hit by a tear gas canister fired by Chilean riot police.

Hasta La Victoria’s music is rock and punk, hip hop and circus.

They have found an outlet to focus their pain and their suffering. 

To define it, and direct it back.

When they are on stage, they are on fire…

“In the beginning, we started to play together to diffuse the tension and to be able to support each other,” Camilo says. “But then it started to get serious — more professional,” we started rehearsing more and that’s how the group was created.”

At home in his apartment, Camilo picks out melodies on his keyboard. He sits under the poster of a smiling man in a blue background with the words, Justice for Christian Valdebenito. Lyrics spill from his head. 

His black cat Lilly rubs against his jeans. He reaches down to scratch her neck.

Camilo writes words to songs that will be sung. 

He was wounded. But he is not alone.

And he says… he will continue. 

Like so many others who were injured and mutilated by state security forces during those days, their lives have changed forever. 

But they have risen above it. And each song is their own act of resistance.

Standing up, like his band… Until Victory.

Hi folks, thanks for listening. I’m your host Michael Fox.

October 18 is the anniversary of the start of Chile’s 2019 mass protest movement.

I met Camilo late last year, when I was reporting on the fifth anniversary of the start of the protests. He and everyone in the band Hasta La Victoria are such an incredible inspiration. 

I’ll add some links in the show notes to their work, YouTube and Instagram pages. Please check them out.

Folks, I have incredible news… This week, this podcast, Stories of Resistance, won a Gold in this year’s Signal Awards for best history podcast. 

It’s amazing. I couldn’t be happier. Thank you for listening, sharing and voting to support the podcast. The Real News’s legendary host Marc Steiner was also in the running for a Signal Award for best episode host. And he also won a gold! Congratulations Marc. So well deserved. 

I’ll add some links in the show notes to more information. 

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This is the latest episode of Stories of Resistance, a podcast series produced by The Real News. Each week, I bring you stories of resistance and hope like this. Inspiration for dark times. If you like what you hear, please subscribe, like, share, comment, or leave a review.

Thanks for listening. See you next time.