Bio

In 1998 Alberto and Jorge Columbus studied physics at the University of Puerto Rico in Humacao. Alberto spent more time playing the guitar in the corridors than studying and it occurred to The Loser to start a band. Chelo would play the drums, Alberto the guitar, we thought Jorge could sing, the great Ricardito borrowed a bass so that he could learn to play and The Loser would play the second guitar. Mary Joe proposed the name: POLBO. Once we began to practice we had to take out The Loser and then Steven arrived. We set out to play at the local bars with covers of The Doors, The Beatles, Weezer and Nirvana. While playing in crummy bars in Yabucoa we realized that nobody knew the songs that we were playing so it was the same if we played covers or original songs. So Alberto began to use all his knowledge in quantum physics to try to decipher the secrets of the musical composition. He reached a conclusion: it is necessary to write many songs and then choose the best ones, and that is what we did.

Chelo left and Eduardo Marques entered and gave the band a punk injection on the drums. By then, original music was being accepted by the public more than covers, and the songs continued coming from Alberto’s notebook. Joel de Jesus became the manager and booked shows in venues in the metropolitan area where the underground rock movement was at on the island. Jorge took his 350MHz computer and recorded a demo of 5 songs that seemed as if it had been recorded at a toll during a traffic jam. We sold the demos at the shows, and by word of mouth, the venues began to fill up and the Puerto Rican rock websites where giving us positive reviews. A great deal of people from the indie and punk scene came out the bars to see us.  We realized that a lot of the crowd was made up of musicians from other bands and they were our biggest support. It was in these shows that we where approached by several directors who offered to help us create our first music videos.

  In 2000 Josean came to the ranch where we practiced. We all feared him, so we offered him alcohol and money in exchange for playing bass in the band, but these people would only stop by once in a while. Months later, Eric de la Cruz would become part of the band on the drums. Eric began to speak to us of higher musical concepts, but we ignored it. By then we played with bands like Circus, the Sect, and others. Fofé (Circus) approached us and introduced us to Jose Luis Colon who offered to manage us and introduce us to Gustavo Menéndez.  Each time we felt that we were closer to meeting the Head of the World finally, which Gustavo assured us he knew. After a few months Gustavo called us and we went to record our first album in the Warehouse Studios in Miami with the aid of Waldi. Gustavo produced the album and presented it to several labels. Universal took a risk and in 2005 we signed a recording contract. Returning to Puerto Rico, we continued playing and practicing. We decided that if Jorge could neither sing nor play guitar, he would have to only do one of two things. It was then that we met the guitarist Harold Sanders (who proudly alleges to be family of Colonel Sanders). He was willing to travel more than 2 hours to go to Aguada where we practiced, and it was also the only criteria used to allow him in the band. We then received a call to let us know that we were nominated for the Latin Grammys, and decided to take the trip and see if we could touch Shakira or a member of RBD.

 After our return to PR a few new faces became part of the band. Andres on the bass and on everything else including keyboard, chorus, guitar and anything asked, Bebo.  These two musicians that even knew the songs before doing them took Polbo to another level musically. Now with Eric, Andres, and Bebo (formal musicians) constantly monitoring rehearsals, we were forced to play better.  In these last two years, we have revised new songs and selected the best of Polbo to produce a history making album.  Including songs that will make you dance, sing, laugh, have fun, and cry.  They will change pop culture forever.  See you at the next show.