Miguel Bocamuerta
When we speak about Miguel Bocamuerta, it is like speaking about Burroughs and Keats, about purity and, above all, romanticism.
And as far as we can remember, there have never been such lyrics as Miguel's since Ray Heredia who sang “súmala, súmala bien, que si la sumas mal, los tiempos cambiarán” (“Add it up, add it up well, because if you add it up wrong, the times will change”).
Alarrota (Broken Wing), as he called himself, escaped from his provincial world of Cordoba, tried Madrid, tried this, that and the other and finally, ended up studying music in Barcelona. And that is where his double bass became his shadow, forever. Barcelona was his last stop, but his heart was always closer to the sun than to anything else.
Rooted in the south, in Cordoba, where gypsy women give you life and offer you flowers. Fond of drunken atmospheres and of cheap restaurants, where Javier Krahe likes to have his lunch, and of whales with stories, now sung by him (“Moby Dick”).
It is in dark corners (where things always happen-, or so he said) and with the ghosts that Tom Waits dreams of, where Miguel was at his ease. Smells of squalidness, deterioration, horror. Horror and always love, love as in when you a pick petals off a daisy and you know that with the last petal your life will end.
Miguel Bocamuerta - “Tú en Marte y yo en Plutón” - 2007
Producer: Fernando Vacas
Label: eureka discos
“Tú en Marte y yo en Plutón” (You on Mars and me on Pluto) was recorded during Christmas season of 2004, in the middle of a world war. Recorded in the eureka studios in Cordoba, the production is by his soul mate Fernando Vacas who, after laughing and crying with Miguel's lyrics, decided to finish and present to the world a legacy that is not far from the Velvet Underground, Nick Cave, David Lynch, nor far from the new indie hero Bob Dylan (note “Como un perro”).
There are many worlds, this is true, but none so close to that crazy world where there was only one flower (“Buscando flores”), a sun…a sleeping plane and stars, many stars…Miguel embellishes it during a night at the fair with a Ferris wheel and in just (look out!) ten minutes he tells us about a sexual adventure that was thwarted at the top of the fairground attraction, but with all its humour and poetry; the story is told in “La noria” (the ferris wheel).
There is not much more left to be said about such great and true lyrics. Pure nakedness, in which John Lurie is an American ally to an unknown Wim Wenders to rescue lost angels painted like whores in red hued brothels in the song “Llamadas sin respuesta”. Irony and sarcasm about the world of drug abuse (“a gram of illusion and a quarter of hope/are not enough for a feast so there will be a massacre”) . And quoting Cioran, anguish and love as an all moving force in “Por enésima vez” (“with one foot on the summits of despair/and another in some corner, near your heart”). There is no need to comment on his interpretation of the war in “Viva yanqui”.
…In the end, the coloured balloons we can see on the cover of the album were stronger than the soles of the little prince’s shoes and now the Earth is far away.
This is for you, Miguel.
