Over the last year, a Mexican fashion style has surfaced far beyond the dancefloors where it originated. In late August, Rosalía posted a photo on Instagram wearing white leather boots with elongated toes curving upward and “La Rosalía” stamped along the sides. The following month, Latin art-pop artist Caín Culto wore knee-high brown cowboy boots with similarly extreme points on the cover of his debut album, CULTO. Because neither artist makes tribal guarachero, the Mexican electronic genre most associated with the style of boots, it was clear: The aesthetic had crossed over to the mainstream.
Tribal guarachero, or tribal, as it’s commonly known, developed through related but distinct regional strands, becoming a youth movement in Monterrey, Mexico, with competitions to create the most exaggerated boots — mostly DIY, using plastic hosing, foam, leather, glitter and LED lights.
Related
In 2011, when VICE released Mexican Pointy Boots, a documentary about tribal guarachero and its style, its mainstream breakthrough accelerated — as did that of its most commercially successful act, 3BallMTY. The trio’s hit single, “Inténtalo” (the title track to its 2011 debut album), delivered a polished, crossover-ready version of tribal while its music video placed the then-teenaged Monterrey DJ-producers alongside dancers in pointy boots.
“Inténtalo” reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart in 2012 and the trio went on to win best new artist at the Latin Grammys. When Rosalía recently visited Monterrey, 3BallMTY’s Erick Rincón told Billboard her team contacted the group for help finding a pair of the boots.
Caín says his aim in wearing the boots was to expand the cowboy archetype, pairing the “witchy” and “phallic” style with his music’s sexuality. For an early music video, he made a pair from construction materials he bought at The Home Depot; now, a Los Angeles cobbler makes him custom pairs.
And while the boots are having a moment, the genre is, too. 3BallMTY’s DJ Otto says its visibility is cyclical, telling Billboard in August, “Every 10 years, things come back around.” This latest wave is carrying tribal into new clubs, cities and even launching hybrid forms. Tribal Sound System, a party created by Mexico City-based DJ Rosa Pistola and La Chekera Records, launched this September in Paris. Meanwhile, Mexico City-based collective and independent label N.A.A.F.I, founded in 2010, released TRIBAL 2025 last December, a compilation that gathered experimental producers who fold tribal into reggaetón, techno and cumbiatón. Label co-founder Tomás Davó says tribal is “a genre in Mexico for all the country’s youth,” but its latest revival has become a global movement. “They’re associated with club culture,” Caín says of the boots, “so there was something underground that I resonated with.”
This story appears in the Oct. 10, 2026, issue of Billboard.