Los Amores Imaginarios, Vol. 1 – Federico (Uruguayan Independent Artist)

A middle-aged couple hired a young girl to look after their kids while they attended a party. The girl arrived early in the evening, and she stayed with the children as the couple went their way.
And everything was going fine, until the husband’s mobile rang. It was the girl, she wanted to know if she could cover the clown’s statue in the kid’s room because the children were scared by it, and they couldn’t get to sleep. The man said we don’t have a statue of a clown in our house, quick get the kids out and call the police.
It turned out the clown was a convict who had broken into the house.

And if you don’t copy and paste this text in the wall of five of your Facebook friends, tonight at 3 AM the clown will be at your bed, with a chainsaw in his hands.

 

 

OK, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. That was too good a chance to miss. I’m sorry. I won’t ever do that again, I swear by God almighty and by my High School Musical DVD.

Today, it’s time to cover a new Uruguayan artist on this blog. And I’ve found one that has got quite an interesting background. His name is Federico, and in addition to being a recording artist of his own he runs an independent label named Nikikinki Records. This label gathers together a distinctive number of Uruguayan performers, but some international acts have been joining its ranks recently.
So, if you visit Nikikinki’s website you’ll be able to download music from local performers such as Ari Vinitzki, Lila Tirando a Violeta, Fabián Echandía and Turra Total, along with Eric Bejaranbo (from Mexico) and Johnny Slidell (from the US) to name just a few.
In all cases, the music you can find on the site is available at zero cost. You just have to submit your e-mail address, and that’ll be the start of a thousand lives with the music of this league of extraordinary gentlemen.

Federico himself has released two volumes of love songs named “Los Amores Imaginarios” [Imaginary Loves], and he also fronts a band which goes by the name of “Julen y la Gente Sola” [Julen and the Lonely People]. I became familiarized with his work while I was online one day, goofing around on Facebook. I came across a live performance of his, he had posted a song named “Asuntos Ajenos” [Other People’s Businesses], and I gave it a whirl. Usually, I click on such videos and then keep on scrolling down my news feed. And that’s precisely what I did when I first crossed paths with “Asuntos Ajenos”.
But I didn’t get very far. A couple of seconds into the performance, I stopped scrolling down. I was listening.
And when Federico started singing, I had to scroll up again to see him play. There was a sort of magnetism both in his voice and his overall demeanor. You couldn’t call it technical prowess, you couldn’t call it interpretative proficiency or smoothness. But it was some sort of coruscating quality all the same.

And you know, that’s good news. Really good news. That’s what I always want to see on young performers.

Frankly, I was amazed. I mean, not amazed in the same way Taylor Swift is amazed at awards shows, and she puts her patented OMG face on, like this:


(If you look carefully, you’ll also notice that when this happens Taylor Lautner is always, always on the very first row. He’s staring all dove-eyed at T Swizzle, until he realizes the cameras are on him! And when that happens, he turns his head with haste, as if thinking “Oops, I’m not supposed to harbor feelings for her any longer!”
I hate you! Vile monster! How could you break our sweetheart of the rodeo’s heart?! Hope they cast you in a suckass saga with endless sequels! Hope you’re condemned to do the same mediocre role for ever!
Oh, wait…)

But I was surprised by how much Federico could elicit, by how much he could transmit in a way that seemed so effortless. And I decided to take a closer look at his work.

So, I downloaded the first volume of his “Amores Imaginarios”. And that’s the album I want to tell you about today.

According to the liner notes, Federico recorded the 12 songs that are included between 2009-2011 on his bedroom, using an acoustic guitar and his computer. This is a lo-fi album by definition, so that if you’re enamored with Okkervil River’s marauding guitars on songs such as “We Need A Myth” then I’m afraid you’ll have to browse. This album is not about sounding good, it’s about conveying ideas in a way that’s unembellished and completely spontaneous.
We could debate incessantly how valuable such a thing is from an artistic point of view; writers like Victor Hugo used to claim that there’s nothing more detrimental to art than the rush of inspiration, that ideas have to be diligently refined, and that the greatest works come from a process in which corrections and reformulations are always in order. Conversely, authors like Byron (who were uttermost expressionists) felt that saying what one had to say in the way that it would naturally come out was the fairest thing to do.

How much you’ll get from an album like this one (and from most of Nikikinki’s oeuvre, actually) depends on where you stand on this debate. If you collapsed to the floor and cried aloud “Deflower me! Deflower me, Dave!!” when the Foo Fighters won their last Grammy Award and Grohl mentioned that they had recorded the album at their very own garage, then look no further than this. Continue reading

Casablancas Release Their Debut Ep: “Please Don’t Be Like Me”

Good ol’ Pete Townshend. He releases a chunky bio, and the standout passage is the one in which he confesses he fancied the ass off Mick Jagger when he was young. Actually, he mentions that he fancied another part of the Rolling Stone’s physiognomy. But let’s leave it at that, OK?
It just had to be.
Then, Kelly Clarkson announces the release of her first “Best Of” package, and when you glance at the tracklist “Sober” is nowhere in sight. “When beauty meets ignorance they shout in the street”, right darling? What’s your excuse?
It just had to be.
And now, Casablancas release their first EP, “Please Don’t Be Like Me”.
And is it any good?
It just had to be.

Casablancas, my half-blood brothers from the Merseyside. I’m going to write a movie script about the time I spent with the core of them when I was younger, maybe someone at Disney buys it for the next “Star Wars” trilogy. For chrissake, they hired Billy Ray Cyrus to do a show! It can’t be that difficult…

This EP (download it for free) was recorded by the band and their producer, Álvaro de León.  Casablancas comprises Martín Rela on voice and guitar, Syd Jay on guitar, Nacho Lorenzelli on bass and Seba Moroni on drums. Álvaro de León added guitars, piano and Hammond to several numbers.
In case you want to put faces to names, there you go. Yes, I know. It would be delightful to have one of these magnificent photographs in which the whole band is featured in a clockwise manner. But I never learned to use Photoshop, I was too busy learning how to write movie scripts, OK?

Martín Rela

 

Syd Jay

 

Nacho Lorenzelli

 

Seba Moroni

 

The guys define themselves as a group of friends who love making music and having a good time on the liner notes. But that doesn’t mean they are doing things by half measures. No, not at all. They’re a true example of commitment, and a firm reminder that anything can be accomplished by sheer strength of will and devotion.

“Please Don’t Be Like Me” features five different compositions, all penned by the band. You have the two songs they had recorded when Casablancas came around a couple of years ago, and the band played their first “Pepsi Bandplugged” competition amidst pussy-willows, cattails and fluorescent adolescents. They are “0800 Casablancas” and “Liverpool”. They have been revamped, and their present selves are a lot beefier thanks to the fuller-sounding production.

But the new cuts are the ones that make more of a lasting impression, for the simple reason that these songs reveal a sense of dynamics that I just didn’t know the guys had in them. Besides, Martín’s voice has grown different – there’s more of a gruff in it. Time doesn’t go by in vain, I guess. It’s only natural that the moon and the sun will change places, as if in a race to meet the ribbons of the morning first.
And cigarettes can fuck up one’s voice in no time, also. Whatever. Martín’s vocals now suit the material a great deal better. Continue reading