«He is a punk troubadour who does not evade and treats everything head-on»

by time news

Among the records that she keeps on her shelf, Miren Iza rescued a “dirty and dusty” CD, and she had no doubts that it had been ‘The record of her life’. Although perhaps it would be more appropriate to talk about the double record of his life. And it is that ‘Cajas de Música Difíciles de Parar’, Nacho Vegas’s second solo album, has twenty cuts and four ‘bonus tracks’ that came out shortly after his EP ‘4 new dramatic songs by Nacho Vegas’. “He had some very prolific years, especially after the impact of his debut ‘Inexplicable Acts,'” says Iza.

With those songs, the man from Gijon ironized and shook off the burden of the cursed musician that has always accompanied him, «although listening to him again, he made me feel between tenderness and a little laugh, because of that tremendousness that it contains and the tragicomic background of songs like ‘ Your New Dehumidifier’».

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But the singer-songwriter from Hondarribia goes back to her university years in Oviedo to justify that, “more than a universal classic, she wanted to choose a personal classic”. These ‘music boxes’ fell into her hands at a ‘life transition’ moment, as a twenty-fourth birthday present from her mother. She “she listened to Him obsessively all day. And she sank me and saved me with him, because at that moment I felt like a ‘Barojian’ character locked up studying in a room in Asturias and it was my escape route».

As were those walks with the ‘discman’ listening to the prophet in his land, always on the lookout for him to appear around every corner. “Of course I ran into him!” she admits. «I wrote to him and we had an email relationship that helped me a lot to escape from where he was and one day I met him at the La Plaza de Gijón bar. Although later I have not coincided much more with him and almost better, because that way it remains as a memory-sanctuary».

daughter of a song

Beyond the personal, professionally «his influence on my music was enormous. In fact, until I listened to it again, I hadn’t been aware that a song from my first album titled ‘Suremente me lo deserve it’ is a daughter of his ‘Monomanía’». A time that was marked by this soundtrack and some compositions that were soaked in it. “That’s why it can really be one of the albums of my life, with which I have had a transcendental relationship and it still gives me goosebumps.”

In this work, Vegas already leaves traces of its essence. The one that drinks from Nick Drake, Lou Reed or Cohen and that is written from the sentimental, family and political turbulence, far from the coolest indie. «He is a punk troubadour, dirty and stark, who does not evade and treats everything head-on, without a vocation for superficiality. My friends told me to get out of his world once and for all », he jokes.

A follower of Manta Ray, when Vegas decided to continue her career away from the gang, Iza let instinct guide her after him. «In 2001, beyond Los Planetas, it was not usual for indie to be done in Spanish, and those of us who had been absurdly educated in Anglo-Saxon were freaked out by Nacho». She acknowledges that she has never been “such a fan of anyone” and that she waited “like rain in May” for the release of her third album ‘Disappear Here’ to go buy it. “That hasn’t happened to me anymore, but who knows? Maybe in a few years they ask me and I choose ‘Motomami’».

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