The style of music known as cumbia originated off the coast of Colombia, a mixture of indigenous South American and Latin American rhythms and the influence of the Yoruban tribe of Africa. It was always silky and funky at the same time, syncopated and spunky, and in the hands of a pair of bands coming to the Cedar Cultural Center tonight for an irresistible double-bill — Grupo Fantasma and Chico Trujillo — it has been updated and turbo-charged with salsa and 20^th Century North American funk.

When Prince hires you to spruce up his act, you know you’ve found a funky sweet spot. That’s the case with Grupo Fantasma, a 10-piece crew of Latin and North American musicians who have nested for the past decade in the ever-thriving and diverse music scene of Austin, Texas. Prince has regularly recruited the band for his Las Vegas club 321 and for award-show appearances. It’s easy to hear why — both Grupo and the little purple dude favor whip-snap beats and hairpin rhythmic turns that your body wants to emulate. And like Prince, Grupo bandleader Adrian Quesada is a sneaky guitar god, erupting with solos that transform tunes into rock revelries that pubescent head-bangers would be proud to claim. (Check out “El Desconocido” from Grupo’s MySpace page.)

You’d think Grupo Fantasma alone would suffice for a snazzy Cedar attraction. But the little club-that-could double-dips in splendid fashion by booking Chico Trujillo as the opening act.

Hailing from Chile, Chico plays a more overtly cumbia-style music than Grupo, albeit one mastered by folks who started as a ska-punk band known as LaFloripondio.

There is salsa and ska and bolero and a healthy dollop of kitsch interwoven with traditional cumbia on their latest, the marvelous “Chico de Oro.” A cumbia-salsa hybrid like “Varga Varga” will feature Michael Magliocchetti’s wavy guitar lines filtering up like heat waves off the blacktop. But on the very next track, “Maria,” the group will break out the accordions and the suave vocals. And on “Ahora Quien,” the rhythm section canters alongside Macha Asenjo’s talk-sung narrative while the horns roar in to put even more centrifugal force in the syncopation. (You’ve got to love the evocative names of horn players in Latin bands. Chico Trujillo has the well-deep tonality of Oso Tabile on trombone, and the ritzy trumpeting of Zorra Cabezas. And the name of Grupo Fantasma’s trombonist? Speedy Gonzales — from Philly, no less.)

The bottom line is that both Grupo Fantasma and Chico Trujillo play a scintillating dance variant of their cumbia roots, spangled with cool wrinkles like the percussion-and-whistles break in the middle of Grupo’s “Arroz Con Frijoles,” or the mischievous farfisa organ Chico’s Camilo Salinas will toss into the mix on some of their tunes.

Videos of both bands can be found on the Cedar’s events page for the gig, which only has standing-room tickets left. Otherwise, here is Grupo on an Austin City Limits show from 2007. And here is Chico Trujillo performing “La Medallita.”

Grupo Fantasma and Chico Trujillo at the Cedar Cultural Center, tonight, June 10 at 7:30  p.m.. Tickets $20.