Alex Anwandter

Electrifying triumphs from Ivy Queen, Gerardo Ortiz, Daddy Yankee and (yes!) 27 more.

How Juan Gabriel, Chavela Vargas, Rita Indiana and others changed hearts and minds.

Latin music is all too often reduced to dance-pop, tropical and regional Mexican styles only. Meanwhile, mainstream indie rock (what? it's a thing) is dominated by English-speakers. And what gets left out of those equations? Well, just about every band on this list, for starters. Once the provenance of post-grunge stadium rockers, Latin alt or indie today is a wealth of fascinating scenes and sounds. Don't take our word for it: Check out the awesome Latin indie culture site [Remezcla](http://remezcla.com/), where you'll also find lots of great recaps and video footage from this past week's Latin Alternative Music Conference, the annual showcase of awesome Latin indie-pop, rock, electronic music and hip-hop. You'll find quite a few LAMC participants and performers on our roundup of some of this year's top Latin alt albums so far (such as the woman behind #1, [Xenia Rubinos](http://www.rhapsody.com/goto?rcid=art.53016818)!), plus a bunch more chunky dance beats, alt- _folklorico_, vintage psychedelic cuts, killer indie rock and shimmering electro-pop. Dive in!