Lio Zanarini, interview

I. Name:
Lionel Paolo Zanarini a.k.a Pequeño Leon mutante

II. Name of completed projects, projects under way, and what you play:
Capitanes del Espacio, Syn Criterio, Pequeño Leon Mutante
I play everything and anything that doesn’t dirty my hands, so muddy guitars, freshly painted bass, and powdered drums.
With the Capitanes del Espacio we’ve finished a record called “Oh bananas Ho (the whalesong)¨, which will soon be flooding many record shops in other galaxies.
With Syncriterio we have two records: “Satan” and “La ora del despertar”
And Pequeño Leon Mutante says that he is making things but most of the time he´s a comic.

III. Influences:
Everything and Black Sabbath

IV. What motivates you?:
The Holy Spirit




V. Friend bands:
Siquicos Litoraleños, Hipnoflautas, Pakidermos, Copronautas, Soy tu padre, Klub der Klang, and millions of thousands of millions more.

VI.What’s your music like from a political point of view?
The politics of the Riachuelo by the Makro bridge.


VII. Is the tomato a fruit or vegetable?
I believe that in certain questions man should make silence in honour of knowledge, just so as not to affect or condition the tomato´s self-image.

VIII. Instruments:
The buttocks are THE PERCUSSION INSTRUMENT of excellence

IX. What particular quality would you give to the sound that you like?
COMIC COSMOS

X. What period of history has been a significant catalyst for the birth or development of the music you make?
The period of the life of Walt Disney


X. What period of history has been a significant catalyst for the birth or development of the music you make?
With a lot of imagination

XII. What do you think about the production and edition of records in Argentina?
I don´t know. I asked Syd Barrett and he didn´t know what to say to me.


XIII. Which was the most popular pop song in the year you were born?
THIS MAKES ME REALLY HAPPY
According to the website I consulted
the year that I was born there were lots of great HITS
but this was the song that exploded that year
Y.M.C.A. – The Village People
I think it’s a marvellous song
I feel identified (adjective in feminine)

XIV. Where is a musical group in Argentina heading, which doesn’t enjoy the same open medias and opportunities like those of, for example, Europe, the United States?
In the direction of Love.
In the direction of love?


XV. Describe the best concert you´ve seen in your life.
One with The Fall, but I dreamed it
Nick Cave left me gobsmacked in 98
Sonic Youth converted me into a groupie
Ramones / Motorhead in Velez Stadium
Pantera in Obras Stadium
Pffff, there are lots, Los Autenticos Decadentes

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lionelz/

http://www.capitanesdelespacio.com.ar/

http://www.pequenoleonmutante.blogspot.com/

Buen Viaje Los Siquicos

Crack a bottle of Champagne on the hull of Los Siquicos Litoraleños, as they disappear off to Holland on tour

Here´s a work in progress of the documentary that´s going to warp your mind:



(here´s what Jorge and Dick say)

ENCANDILAN LUCES – Lights Dazzle

Jorge:
Imagine that aliens land in Curuzu Cuatia, but instead of invading Corrientes they fall in love with Chamame, Peñas, the Cumbias at parties, and they become musicians.
Only the delirium of nature can explain Los Siquicos Litoraleños

Dick:
You can get lucky living in a lost village where strong characters get together, with no outside influences reaching them, they can go further than in a city where all the information reaches them. They live in a town where nobody bombards them with their own criteria.

Jorge:
Without doubt this lacking, and the limitations of the resources with which they record, creates the magic of the group. I can´t imagine anything similar being made with professional instruments. It would lose all its magic, and I think they know that.

Dick:
The good thing about the Siquicos is that they are actually living in those conditions, so there´s no doubting their sincerity, they´re doing an investigation just using their own points of reference. That´s great.

Jorge:
Cumbia, Chamame, which is something I´ve been getting into, popular music, but if you give it a strange or bizarre twist, of course it´s going to be more powerful.

Dick:
It´s really easy, with few resources, to transform this into magic. There are a lot of people doing it, but once you´re into it you can send it out into the world, it´s easy. It´s just that, well, you´ve got to be found.

Mambo Sandoval, interview

I. Name:
Mariano Juan Sandoval o Mambe.

II. Name of completed projects, projects under way, and what you play:
Azur since 2005, Mainumby Ediciones label since 2006, Minimalista País since 2008, La Luz Cadente since 2009, collaborator with Leeev´b

III. Influences:
Fellow bands (and not so fellow bands) are a really really big influence. Also other things like the sound of boats passing slowly, the voices of my family, the streets, animals, extra-musical forms and the combination of colours in sunsets, are a good influence at times. Its in those moments that I feel enthusiasm with those who give me music, and this is sharing and releasing at the same time: Kate Bush, My Bloody Valentine, ABBA, Tiny Tim, Young Marble Giants, The Ronettes (and lots of 50s pop), The Knife, Kellies, Epiref, Dick El Demasiado, Wave Tank, MALARIA!, Strawberry Switchblade, Martin Rev, Leonard Cohen, Nico, Dark Day, Klaus Nomi, Dan Deacon, Cecilia Todd, Os Mutantes, Gilda, Los Mirlos, Transito Cocomarola (and the amazing Paraguayan harp), Shirley Collins, Violeta Parra, Norman McLaren, Jan Svankmajer, Ingman Bergman, David Lynch, Jorge Luis Borges, Fernando Pessoa, William Blake, “Acéphale”, Louis Wain.

IV. What motivates you?:
What pushed me towards doing these exercises which ended in ¨music¨was something similar to an intuition, an image, a sound, an interrupting voice, and wanting to share the experience, run the risk, something naughty, something imaginative, like playing, living, trying, playing and listening again: it all came out fairly casually, like luck, trivial, even though it wasn’t through error. And it can be something so unusual, the strength which motivates one to discover oneself, to come out from the enclosed, to express oneself, to dilute oneself in the preponderance and its creative faculty, with which the conscious intelligence isn’t the motive, the incitation, but talent, excitement, temperament in the development, dreams. Trust, caring for those who are present, enjoyment at spreading the word by word of mouth, or inventing according to the situation, the majority of times with amusing results, but at other times they are proverbs or formulas. They seem to be useless sacrifices, “lets drink”, “a friend on Myspace”, “let’s fuck up” and somebody comes up with something new which changes us, pushes us forward. So we put adornments, loops, a guitar, obsessive little songs, improvised fragments, and in that moment the heart brings us a smile.

V. Friend bands:
Pretzel, Im, Betty Confetti, Omasin, Nebel Dots, Liz, Mothers Day, Los Siquicos Litoraleños, Klub Der Kang, Trampa de Osos, Good Time For Dynacom, Yon, Puffy Eyes.















VI. What’s your music like from a political point of view:
The music is like something given to us, offered from the most delicious, and like one of the things that one wants most of all. One tries to give, offer respect, friendship, make it grow and multiply what one learns from the others and oneself. Because if you don’t submit (and you force it) you don’t get anything back, and in that case giving and receiving get confused. It’s basically making your instrument distribute, look for the amplification, make it something that has lots of strengths, diversions, series, combinations and in these conditions the music becomes visible and relative and one becomes multiple.

VIII. Instruments:
Bass, double bass, synthesizers and 60s technologu, ukelele, Casio keyboard, voices, delay, chorus, flanger.

IX. What particular quality would you give to the sound that you like?
Particularly noisy, simple, repetitive.

X. What period of history has been a significant catalyst for the birth or development of the music you make?
In its oldest and most general form there’s a really long period of time that I love, in which the “scene” fills me with wonder, back then in the 5th Century B.C. Also Palestrina. And the “Lollypop generation”, those boys and girls from the 50s and 60s. Also Teutonic Post Punk.

XI. How do you combine your visual aesthetic with the aural?
I try not the disassociate the two, even though sometimes the search to make the disassociation bring about new sensibilities. From the corporeal, the light, videos and slide projections, the optic begins to associate, motivate, generate, effect what appears to me as worth making the most of.

XII. What do you think about the production and edition of records in Argentina?
The production has been increasing in quality and quantity, displaying differing and similar forms. There are things in Argentina that really deserve to be seen and heard.

XIV. Where is a musical group in Argentina heading, which doesn’t enjoy the same open medias and opportunities like those of, for example, Europe, the United States?
I think that the locus of the musician is very important, and in some cases it’s a determining factor. In poor places there is a lot of incredible music, beautiful, transparent. In the rich and economically powerful places there are more institutions and institutionalized relationships which guarantee and support production. There is production, communication and technology in both places, even if they exist in different forms. In poor and rich places things come out of the exclusion and inclusion, or from the conditions and opportunities. There are always conditions, but through not being total, unchangeable, they constantly create opportunities. Those who are victims of an economic impotence show that they can also play music and dance, that’s to stay, what is a real subjection gives birth to a fictitious relation.

Fede Paladino with Azur

Here's a video made by Fede Paladino using a live recording of Azur.

Azur and La Octava Sagrada

Archibrazo 4th September

This was the first of a kind of siamese gig, with Azur playing the same place, same time the next day but with Los Siquicos Litoraleños. Unfortunately I missed the latter, but thankfully not this one.


Weathering the shifting forms of the groups that surround them Azur remain solid after more than four years of playing and recording their dreamy soundscapes.
Gabi Coll plays keyboards and synth, Ale Coll generally picks away at his guitar, Mambo Sandoval is the meditative bassist while Nico Valiente gets his laptop whirring.

In Nico's absence the three found their sound without the computer, which tends to give the music its hypnotic packaging, and this removal of the comfort blanket revealed a sturdy unit of musicians, locked into their own groove but in definite unison.

Gabi's poppy keyboard sequences are pushed out of the speakers with a sinister tinge, filtered through loops and pedals, where they intertwine with Ale's adept guitar and mandolin twiddlings. It's always easy to fall back on delay pedals to get that distant electronic sound, but here there's an avoidance of the obvious, a weaving of the strange and beautiful, and then the simple. The bass is nothing complicated, but a point of relaxation for the ear, at a good slow pace, a tonic.

www.myspace.com/estoesazur



Charly Zaragoza couldn´t have anything but stage presence, this time with a cherry on top with his red t-shirt and Santa´s Helper hat. La Octava Sagrada is his solo project after ÜL, Klub der Klang, Virgin Vapor... where his astute aural fiddlings are irreplaceable. He plays strange shaped guitars, roll-up toy keyboard, Kaos pad plus numerous pedals and devices, and some normal instruments too! The best part of his set was an accordian sample doing some very visceral things over modified sounds and sputters. He plays layering, building on loops and organic blips, and shows us what it is to do the ¨noise¨ thing all alone. Long live La Octava Sagrada!





www.myspace.com/laoctavasagrada