Thursday, June 21, 2012

Joaquín Sabina y Viceversa en Directo



Ningún artista se atrevería a hacer una canción como "Cuervo Ingenuo" hoy, y en el caso de que algún ingenuo lo hiciera, ninguna estación de radio la transmitiría, ninguna compañía la sacaría en un CD, y seguramente no llegaría a Youtube. El contingente políticamente correcto español, ese que le dice "africanos subsaharianos de piel negra oscura" a los negros y al que tanto critica Arturo Pérez Reverte, dirían que es irrespetuosa a los pueblos indígenas de América, como le pasó a los cuentos de Tin Tin.

Es una lástima, porque la letra de "Cuervo Ingenuo" es tan vigente hoy como hace 25 años, o quizá más: en realidad, no sabemos si Felipe González hubiera sido tan permisivo con los bancos o si hubiera perdido tiempo precioso en la legislatura pasando leyes que beneficiaban a clientelas específicas del PSOE (Memoria Histórica, matrimonio de homosexuales) en lugar de reformas económicas que blindaran a España del caos en el que está sumergida.

Quede "Cuervo Ingenuo" como un testimonio de una España que ya no es: un país rico, sin complejos, y con ganas de mirar al futuro.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

La revancha del tango - Gotan Project

La revancha del tango combina tres cosas: tango, como su nombre lo indica; música electrónica y beats, y todo el espectro de la ideología comunista argentina; es decir, fragmentos de discursos guevaristas y peronistas.
Para el optimista, esta es una fusión de lo moderno con lo nuevo con cierto toque de lucha de clase latinoamericanista con alcances artísticos -para ponerlo en términos fidelistas- intergalácticos. Para el enemigo del pueblo, los tonos de bar de la elite de La revancha del tango son una muestra de cómo la izquierda sólo quiere convertirse en derecha (cómo olvidar al Ché en los yates de los gusanos días después del triunfo de la Revolución): listillos que quieren adueñarse de los medios de producción en nombre del pueblo mientras toman martinis en sus casas en la playa con sus meretrices, como hacían los oligarcas anteriores. 

En realidad, La revancha del tango fue un disco revolucionario cuando fue lanzado, hace diez años. Después le siguieron gente como Nortec y otros que buscaron mezclar música tradicional con electrónica. Por su culpa, La revancha del tango es valorado desde una perspectiva política y no artística. Peores cosas han pasado.


Tuesday, June 12, 2012

From Babel to Dragomans - Bernard Lewis

Bernard Lewis is the author one must read to start having a broad idea of the Middle East. For one thing, he was the creator of the expression "clash of civilizations", later popularized by Samuel Huntington, and taken as a guidance for policy by some neo-conservative ideologues in the aftermath of 9/11.

From Babel to Dragomans collects 51 essays written by Bernard Lewis on the Middle East. The topics covered range from gastronomy to U.S. foreign policy, passing through Turkish historiography and several comparative analysis of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. The book is divided in three sections: part 1 deals with   "past history"; part 2, with "current history", and part 3 collects essays on historiography and Orientalism. By construction, books that collect essays tend to be repetitive and From Babel to Dragomans is not an exception. From that perspective, part 1 is probably the best part of the book by providing a quick introduction to Middle East from a scholar perspective -part 2 is too ideologized, and part 3 is too academic.

There are a lot of remarkable quotes in this book, though there is probably one that comes out for its prescience regarding the current events in the Middle East: 

"Where the so-called fundamentalist Muslims and democrats are both in opposition, the former have an immense advantage. In the mosques and preachers, they dispose of a network for meeting and communication that no government, however tyrannical, can entirely control and no other group can rival."

This quotation comes handy now that the popular revolts in Egypt and Tunisia are getting stopped by the military or kidnapped by the Salafists. 

People were too optimistic about the prospects of these two countries to implant functioning democratic regimes. Obviously, the images of young people going out to the streets and risk their lives is shocking and moving at the same time, but any cold and fact-based analysis could see from the beginning that both the military and the Salafists had something that the protesters have lacked since they took the streets: organization and command chains. A political movement cannot be run like an assembly if it really wants to survive. 

Sunday, June 10, 2012

Of Mice and Men - Lewis Milestone

This is a great movie. I have nothing to add to the description of the booklet:

Oscar-nominated for Best Picture of the year (1939), Of Mice and Men was adapted from the classic novel by American literary giant John Steinbeck and features stunningly memorable performances by Burgess Meredith (In Harm's Way, Rocky) and Lon Chaney, Jr. (The Wolfman, High Noon) and a moving, Academy Award-nominated score from legendary composer Aaron Copland. The film,set in the bucolic valley Salinas Valley of California in the 1930s, paints a bold, vivid picture of life in the Depression era and tells the tragic tale of men searching for a safe heaven from the cruelties of a world where true poverty is loneliness and alienation from the loyalty and kindness of other men.
George and Lennie are a pair of itinerant farm hands who dream of someday having their own modest ranch, but in the meantime toil for uncaring ranch owners. George (Meredith) must constantly watch over Lenni (Chaney), who has very few wits but an enormous strength which is always getting them into trouble when he finds a small animal or pretty girl that he innocently wants to caress. Always just a few steps ahead of disaster, the two friends land at yet another farm where circumstances and the help of a fellow dreamers seem to bring their fantasies within reach. It is all the more tragic then when Lennie finds trouble thatthere is no running away from and George is called on to carry out a final and ultimate act of friendship.
For director Lewis Milestone (All Quiet on the Western Front, The Red Pony) Of Mice and Men was a labor of love.He had wanted to adapt the popular novel and play for film since he first read it, but lacked the studio backing. In 1938 he found himself on a legal battle over money he was owed by Hal Roach Studios, and Roach agreed to settle out of court by paying for the production Of Mice and Men. With script in hand, Milestone went to John Steinbeck for his approval and input. Steinbeck requested only a few minor changes, gave his blessing to the production and even took Mileston on a "field trip" to the Salinas Valley farm where the actual events which inspired his story took place. Of the film, Steinbeck would later say "it is a beautiful job. Here Milestone has done a curious, lyrical thing. It hangs together and is underplayed."
The film opened to rave critical reviews and, unfortunately,poor business at the box office. Of course, competing films that year included Gone with the Wind, The Grapes of Wrath (another Steinbeck adaptation) and The Wizard of Oz. Of Mice and Men has since been rereleased, remade on film and television and revived as a play many times for audiences who know a classic when they see one. Critics and scholars agree that this film version remains one of the most faithful and compelling translations of a literary masterwork.

The full movie is available here:


Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Entre todas las mujeres - Varias artistas

Para que un cóver sea considerado exitoso necesita encontrar un dificilísimo balance entre dos cosas aparentemente contradictorias. La primera es aportar algo original. Una canción que intente replicar la versión original al compás está destinada al olvido que, como sabemos, en cuestiones de arte es mucho peor que el fracaso. La segunda es no perder la esencia de la canción original: una canción contestataria con una interpretación pop, como lo que hace Nouvelle Vague, es poco creíble, y hasta un poco irrespetuosa para la gente que conoce el original.

Entre todas las mujeres es una buena idea: un grupo de mujeres interpretan canciones de Sabina, uno de los casanova y seductores más importantes de los últimos 50 años en el mundo de habla española. Desafortunadamente, apenas pasa de ser una ocurrencia. La mayoría de las canciones sufren del primer problema que señalé y apenas intentan aportar algo más a las canciones de Sabina desde el punto musical. Las canciones que intentan aportar caen en el otro extremo y desvirtúan la esencia de la canción.


Acaso la única canción que se salve sea "Corre dijo la tortuga", de Julieta Venegas.


Everyman - Philip Roth

We like to think that old age is a nice part of life. Most of the time, it's not: nothing works the way it used to, pain becomes a constant, and young people show off their youth all the time. One learns how overvalued youth is only when he becomes old. Old age is even worse without a God. Believers at least can find consolation in the idea of an afterlife, something that justifies our passage in this World.

Everyman is one of the most depressing books I've ever read. It starts with the funeral of the main character and finishes with his death. The rest of the book is formulated about the main character's medical history and the decay of his body, which started when he was 9.

Roth discusses Everyman here.




Sunday, June 3, 2012

El Camino - The Black Keys

The last rock & roll band comes from Akron, Ohio.

As long as you are between 25 and 35 years old, The Black Keys makes you believe in music again. (If you are older, you lost faith anyway, and if you are younger, you probably don't even know what music is.)