La Estrella de David is, as I've already said (a few times, actually), one of my favorite spanish acts. David Rodríguez is an unique, discreet musical figure, making indiepop sound organic even when electronics are used and bringing a certain traditional music-esque feeling to his music. The kind of guy that seems to have a very personal and accurate idea of what is the universe his trying to create.
After two full lengths and inumerous collaborations (including his partner La Bien Querida and Joe Crepúsculo, two iconic figures of the contemporary indiepop in Spain as well), came out Júpiter.
It is a 5 track intrumental EP available on bandcamp. A collection of songs where krautrock meets David's signature melodies and with a sense of travelling and movement.
'Autovía' sounds like an homage to Kraftwerk's 'Autobahn'.
In 2008, 'Romancero' pleased our ears and hearts with love and catalan sounds. It was La Bien Querida's debut and now, 3 years later, she's back with 'Fiesta', due to be released on March, 7th via Elefant Records.
'Hoy' is the first single and - I know I should say something - but the feeling is intangible... or maybe I'm simply scared to trap the song into inherent words.
'Qué será la muerte? / me preguntaste un día / y no te sube contestar / si la muerte es mirar y no verte / que la muerte es mirar y no verte''
"What is death? / you asked me someday / and I couldn't tell / if death was to look and don't see you / death is to look and don't see you"
joe crepúsculo ~ supercrepus (producciones doradas, 2008)
in one year, joe released two albums: escuela de zebras and supercrepus. both ended up in 'the best of 2008' lists throughout the blogosphere and other mediums. escuela de zebras was a compilation of songs while the 20 tracks on supercrepus were conceived as a piece with one theme: love. but you won't hear anything near those obvious lines like 'i can't live without you' or 'i love you'. the name supercrepus is a palindrome, and just like this title, the album has this diferent ways to talk about love... even when it seems that isn't talking about love, at all... the great thing about joe and the reason why he's getting a lot of (deserved) attention is his approach towards music and his idea of what is a pop song. he seems to naturally have this understanding and twist and swirl all the conventions and concepts to create a strange, odd and quirky universe where catchy tunes are everywhere... something like the air here on earth.
naive, uplifting and full of life second hand technopop with strange and perfect-to-sing-along lyrics!
(by the way, his next album will be out on october and it'll be called chill out. as joe tells, it sounds diferent from his two previous works, the main theme is the lack of love and the last song is sang by a church choir.)
01. baraja de cuchillos 02. el día de las medusas 03. amor congelado 04. amar en tiempos de democracia 05. los lagartos 06. caja de lluvia 07. sandra (with marta) 08. espada de damocles 09. el faro 10. águas pantanosas 11. los faunos (with jordi irizar) 12. capitán (with elsa de alfonso) 13. vente conmigo 14. ama y haz lo que quieras 15. la canción de tu vida 16. camino de vida (with el ortiga and thelemático rosa) 17. sabores de piña 18. no me acostumbro (with david rodríguez and la bien querida) 19. iván y laura (con daniel descabello) 20. el día de la sardina
junco y diamante ~ junco y diamante (producciones doradas, 2009)
you may already know that i love the music scene from barcelona. lately i've been discovering a lot of great bands and acts that sing in catalan. junco y diamante was one of the first discoveries and i feel that i should've talked about them a long time ago... they are a duo: 1. david rodríguez - from the band los beef and the man behind la estrella de david and one of the most important musicians in barcelona nowadays, either for the music he makes and his work as producer (he produced the amazing debut album from la bien querida). he also is, in my humble opinion, who best describes the atmosphere from the city (or at least how i felt it when i visited it some time ago); 2. joël iriarte that you may know as joe crepúsculo and member of the band tarántula, another iconic figure that has been causing quite a fuss since last year with his edgy songs (tacky? genious? both?) and featuring his two albums (supercrepus and escuela de zebras) among the best of 2008.
here you'll find 4 songs, each dedicated to a diferent comarca (compared to a county) surrounding barcelona. a graphic and geographic exploration with free interpretations of those places. it's beautiful, delicate, intimate and catalan. ('alt penedès' is lovely, probably the best song of this ep (?) and a collaboration with la bien querida). three songs are sang in spanish and one in catalan.
01. alt penedès 02. solsones 03. pallars sobira 04. osona
you can hear four new comarcas at their myspace. myspace
sedaiós is from barcelona and started as a duo that used to get together to do everyday things. as they say on their myspace: '... a group to spend time for those moments that seems you're doing something but in fact your just waiting (while you wait the washing machine clean your clothes, boil the water for pasta or download an episode of dexter).' in moments like this, cristian and gaia used to grab their ukeleles and play. after some time they felt a need for more rhythm and asked jordi (that also plays with joe crepúsculo and la bien querida, among others) to join them... he arrived with a wide variety of maracas and small percussion instruments. the last members to join the band wwere elena, a common friend that played saxophone and wanted to practice and rafa, also in the horns section. this is their first album and is filled with happy, optimistic and summerish tunes about usual everyday things. the melodies are extremely precious with delicate arrangements. you'll probably get yourself singing 'pa pa ra pa pa' or clapping in almost every song. they sing in catalan and french (which makes everything even more interesting)... in fact it's possible to hear some melodic references to french chanson in tracks like 'ingrid & humphrey' or 'reveiller avant toi'. an album filled with a happy naivety or a naive happiness, feel free to choose which one suits you best. urban and yet organic, full of blue skies and clouds resembling smiles.
(ps: it's ok if you feel addicted for 'bam bam', 'resoldre problemes' and 'perdo el cap').
01. els vells 02. bam bam 03. ingrid & humphrey 04. resoldre problemes 05. reveiller avant toi 06. històries, llibres i cançons 07. elena 08. perdo el cap 09. aquesta nit
here's a video taken from the release concert of the album...
la estrella de david ~ la estrella de david (el ejército rojo, 2007)
i've talked about david rodriguez before: 1. has a solo project called la estrella de david 2. the guy behind the production of 'romancero', debut album of spanish indie sensation la bien querida; 3. member of indie band los beef 4. has a duo project with (the also great) joe crepúsculo. well, you can see by the number of music projects he's a very prolific guy.
back in 2006 - if i'm not mistaken - i found a demo from his solo project 'la estrella de david'... and fell in love completely. i remember that on the winter of 2007 i went on an eurotrip with two friends and, while we were in barcelona, i couldn't stop listening to his songs. in the same year, he released his full lenght. what i think is wonderful about him is the ability to make music from diferent styles but always with a catalan spirit. and he has been doing it in a brilliant way (musically and lyrically). david it's in a place on the spanish music scene that can only be taken by him but yet there's a will of never stop, always go ahead and never settle. almost twenty songs recorded at home, telling what's going on and what to dream about. sometimes looking inside (deep inside), sometimes outside. a strong mixture of rock and indiepop, lo-fi, disonant sounds, surprising arrangements and (of course) catalunya.
01. tremendas amazonas 02. fin de año 03. no és fácil 04. la chica más guapa de españa 05. no hacia falta 06. pipak jaten 07. tu lo tienes que saber 08. bellísimos 09. música industrial 10. la catalana 11. david 12. popeya es presidente 13. vejaciones en la costa 14. lost of fun 15. mientes 16. felices fiestas 17. tremendas amazonas (versiómn sosegada) 18. la seleción natural
joe crepúsculo ~ escuela de zebras (producciones doradas, 2008)
lately, i've been listening a lot spanish pop (discovering things, rediscovering others)... spain has one of the most interesting, fresh and creative scenes. and for coincidence i've been listening to artists that often work together... i've already posted 'romancero', from la bien querida. today's music comes from joe crepúsculo that appears as guest in the (beautiful) a.d.n. from her album. the producer of 'romancero' was david rodríguez, that plays guitar in 'después de la muerte' and also has a side project with joe called junco y diamante (david also is the guy behind the awesome la estrella de david). the artists above are among the most important of today's spanish scene, setting a more experimental approach on pop music. 'escuela de zebras' is one of the best albums of last year, according to various blogs, sites and magazines and is easy to understand why... it contains creative tunes, mostly with electronics, transitions and synths. sometimes, the choice of sounds stay close to bizarre but it works extremely well to create joe's odd and decadent universe full of karaoke rooms, impossible loves, philosophy and simple subjects. it is decadent but, also, very original. musically, it seems that is twisted and elements that would be questionable, like the use of screaming backing vocals or rhymes that don't really fit, sound extremely coherent. joe crepúsculo has a peculiar point of view that sounds childish but in fact works as another angle on naivety ( what else to say about a guy that spends almost five minutes singing about the four elements of the nature... or about old people and what it takes be feel and act like one...).
(ps: couldn't forget to mention that this and his latest album are available to download on his website!)
01. escuela de zebras 02. los cazadores 03. gabriela (with dani descabello) 04. los cuatro elementos 05. canción estival 06. los cazadores parte 2 07. fiesta mayor 08. los viejos (with thelematico rosa) 09. la lucha 10. ya llega la navidad 11. después de la muerte (with david rodríguez) 12. suena brillante 13. la amistad
la bien querida ~ romancero (elefant records, 2009)
ana fernandez-villaverde is la bien querida. she caught some attention with a demo from 2007 and since then, there was much expectation for this release. the music is a mixture of sounds/influences that goes from the melodies like la buena vida, family to traditional arabian music and flamenco. her lyrics tends to talk about love and heartbreaking. that makes her be described by some people as the female stephin merritt, from the magnetic fields... the arrangements are beautiful... rich in sounds to be discovered little by little. david rodrigues (from la estrella de david and junco y diamante) is behind production and does a beautiful job... in fact, i think he's one of the most creative musicians in the spanish scene at the moment... "Ana wanted to domesticate David’s stratospheric arrangements and cubist production toward clean sounds that fit better with the friendly environment of her beautiful songs." (from elefant's site). the album contains moments of flamenco-influenced songs, others full of orchestration or filled with beats and bleeps. it's a beautiful album with great moments ( like the one formed by the first three songs and its extremely delicate mix of instrumentations contrastating with the simplicity of the lyrics and ana's voice). we'll probably hear a lot about la bien querida in the future, but the especulation around this release was too much.
01. ya no 02. corpus christi 03. de momento abril 04. a.d.n. 05. 9.6 06. cuando lo intentas 07. el zoo absoluto 08. 7 medidas de seguridad 09. bendita 10. santa fé 11. los estados generales 12. golpe de estado
video for the first single of the album 'de momento abril'
