Within the first few years of a dazzling, groundbreaking career, Fuerza Regida was able to achieve the kind of landmarks it usually takes most artists a lifetime to check off. The group's acclaimed 2019 debut, Del Barrio Hasta Aquí, helped ignite a movement, as the crossover of corridos tumbados heralded a new age of Latin pop in the following decade. Next, the San Bernardino natives dove into the fertile terrain of música mexicana covers, releasing three blockbuster instalments of the boozy cantina series Pisteando Con La Regida. Fuerza Regida even released an earnest Christmas album titled Navidad Con La Regida, which was a jovial victory lap and a surprising departure for a group that made its name on hard-edged street tales. So after two years of strategic releases, the group was eager to go back to its roots. Del Barrio Hasta Aquí, Vol. 2 arrived in 2021 as a bold, sprawling reminder to anyone who might have thought Fuerza Regida went soft. Setting aside the covers and family-friendly holiday motifs, singer and group leader Jesús Ortiz Paz put extra elbow grease into a batch of original songs that ran the gamut of contemplative, intimidating, and boastful. The massive single “Descansando” paid homage to a friend of Ortiz Paz's who passed away in a car crash, while the immensely popular crossover “Qué Está Pasando” (with Chihuahua ensemble Calle 24) recounts nights of substance-fuelled bar brawls. The album's opening tracks, “Sangre Michoacana” and “Me Acostumbré A Lo Bueno”, are filled with mafioso braggadocio and icy references to the trigger-happy underworld that operates unchecked on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. And while “El Drogas” spins an explicit tale of street corner business, the lighthearted “El Blontezon” alongside Lenin Ramírez intersects with the mellow good times of the corridos 4/20 wave. A few months prior to the release of Del Barrio Hasta Aquí, Vol. 2 Fuerza Regida left Lumbre Music, the label that signed the group shortly after 2018 single “Radicamos En South Central” became a viral hit. While Lumbre helped build the group into an international powerhouse, splitting management and distribution duties with corridos-tumbados architects Rancho Humilde, Ortiz Paz used the new album to consolidate his creative control over the project. Del Barrio Hasta Aquí, Vol. 2 was released in partnership with Street Mob Records, which was founded by Ortiz Paz in 2020, cementing Fuerza Regida's place in the música-mexicana canon.