During his studies, Prodan learned to play the guitar and became heavily influenced by the recent progressive and psychedelic rock music that have emerged during the decade.

[1] After moving to the outskirts of Buenos Aires in 1980 to recover from his heroin addiction, he met Germán Daffunchio, who is the brother-in-law of Prodan's friend from Gordonstoun, Timmy McKern, and Alejandro Sokol, and formed the band Sumo.

His father had set up a prosperous business in ancient Chinese ceramics that became untenable after the Japanese invasion of China during the war.

He was quickly fired, but was soon rehired at the expense of clients who claimed Prodan was "the Italian who could discover the title of a song and its interpreter just by listening to an out of tune whistle."

Prodan's musical sensibilities, influenced by the heyday of British ex-colonial rhythms such as dub and reggae, the latter of which influenced British popular music of that time, were impacted by the personal style of post-punk singer-songwriters such as Joe Jackson, Graham Parker or Elvis Costello, although the irony of Ian Dury & The Blockheads also refers to the jocular and festive style of some of the songs that Prodan would develop as a leader of the Argentine group Sumo.

Luca Prodan was walking on the verge of death and the family postcard he received showed Timmy McKern's Cordoban refuge where everything was life and nature.

He travelled without knowing practically anything about the country, only dreaming of a bucolic photo that McKern had sent him of his family upon the mountains of Córdoba, and viewed it as a paradise.

[11] The same day Prodan arrived in Argentina, McKern went to meet him at the Ministro Pistarini International Airport of Ezeiza and let him stay at his house in Hurlingham, Buenos Aires.

Once presented, Prodan returned to London to start buying instruments and convinced his friend Stephanie Nuttal to be the drummer for his new band.

However, this caused the first disagreements in the group when Curtet disassociated himself, who — having been a father during that time — decided to return to Mina Clavero to take care of his family.

[11] The Falklands War, which initiated in April 1982, caught the band by surpirse, as anything related to the United Kingdom, including the English language, was deemed frowned upon and even prohibited in Argentina; per the request of her parents, Nuttal's made an immediate return to England.

As a result of her departure, Sokol became the drummer and the position of bassist was taken over by Diego Arnedo, who played in a band from Hurlingham called MAM with brothers Omar and Ricardo Mollo.

Pettinato brought to the band a unique style of music that would define Sumo in later songs, mixing rock and his saxophone skills.

[12][13] In 1984, Sokol left the band and, due to the lack of drummers, there were a couple of shows with Prodan playing electronic drums.

Soon after, Prodan heard about a rehearsal at Mítico Café Einstein, a local coffee shop in the heart of Buenos Aires, by the band Oiga Diga and recruited their drummer, Alberto Troglio to replace Sokol.

[11] During these years, Luca Prodan, who did not have a home in Buenos Aires and had made a great friendship with the owners of Mítico Café Einstein, came to sleep on the premises or in their house and playing practically every day.

On weekends, Prodan would work with Sumo and weekdays with his parallel projects The Hurlingham Reggae Band, Ojos de Terciopelo, and Sumito (an acoustic group).

All these groups, with small variations in the formation, played several recitals every weekend in venues not only in the Mítico Café Einstein, but also in other underground strongholds such as Zero, Stud Free Pub, La Esquina del Sol, and Parakultural.

Two years later, Sumo released their first "official" album, Divididos por la Felicidad — titled with the translation of English band Joy Division — in which the songs captured a lot of reggae influences from Bob Marley and also from funk and post-punk, with their single La Rubia Tarada, being the most successful of the LP.

For instance, on 23 May 1987, Prodan went to see fellow Argentine band Patricio Rey y sus Redonditos de Ricota at the Cemento nightclub.

[15] In the same year of the release of After Chabón, Prodan had already fallen into alcoholism, which caused him serious health problems, including incipient liver cirrhosis.

The show was opened up with Los Violadores; the lead singer, Pil Trafa, remembered that he saw Prodan as "very thin, very emaciated.

Two days later, on Tuesday, 22 December 1987, Prodan was found dead in the room he rented in the boarding house located at 451 Alsina Street in San Telmo, Buenos Aires.

Lawyer Albino Stefanolo, who has worked with other famous Argentine artists, was left in charge of handling the situation with the authorities, ultimately establishing Prodan's death as natural causes.