Barcelona as a “personal space & rdquor ;, perhaps a “Workshop in which to work, read and be alone & rdquor;, and a place from which to project a different perception of oneself. That’s why this is Jackson Browne’s new song, song A song for Barcelona ’, The last one that he is preparing with a view to his new album (for the edition planned for autumn), talks about both him and the capital of Catalonia. “It is a song of love for the city, and about Barcelona and me & rdquor ;, The singer-songwriter, who has kept his apartment in Gràcia since the 90s, reveals to this newspaper from his Los Angeles home.
Although he considered the idea of recording the song in Barcelona, with friends such as Raúl Rodríguez, Aleix Tobías or Mario Mas, some setbacks stood in his agenda, before the pandemic, and now it seems more important to him to have paid that “tribute & rdquor; from its cultural tradition. “The song is a rumba, a genre that I would like to know more about. But this is our version of the Catalan rumba. Rumba Californiana! & Rdquor ;, he laughs, an enthusiastic connoisseur of Peret. “This is a song for Barcelona, city of gravety and light / City that gave me back my fire, and restored my appetite & rdquor ;, recite by phone (“This is a song for Barcelona, a city of gravity and light / City that gave me back my fire and regained my appetite & rdquor;). And even more: “city of Gaudi and Jujol / City that raised my desire and, temporarily, the soul & rdquor ;, he adds. “I say temporarily because life is temporary & rdquor ;, he says, clearing suspicions.
After the virus
Jackson Browne has been in quarantine for over a month, and has had covid-19 on his skin, which passed with mild symptoms and from which he is fully recovered. “I ‘ve been very lucky. It has not been worse than any flu & rdquor ;, he explains, and asks how all this is lived in Barcelona, “a densely populated city, with flats in which three generations can live & rdquor ;.
In his country there is no lack of entertainment, provided daily from the highest levels. “You end up having the feeling that the president’s mission is to shake us every day with the greatest stupidity imaginable, and that this is a tactic & rdquor ;, he senses, and regrets to see how the United States “turns its back on the world & rdquor; “From‘ America first ’has moved to‘ first me, and then I & rdquor ;. This time to “examine the world we live in & rdquor ;, points. “We do not have medical assistance, as in Europe, nor are we prepared for disaster. He has already seen Katrina: a better socially organized country, like Cuba, better manages the effects of a hurricane & rdquor ;.
Breaking barriers
The amendment to the system, and the call to ecological awareness, break into the song ‘Downhill from everywhere’, the first released of the new album, and they are not alien to the spirit of their other record project of that year, which they produced in tandem with Jonathan Wilson: ‘Let the rhythm lead: Haiti song summit vol. one’, album released a few weeks ago, covered by Artists for Peace and Justice, group committed to the reconstruction of Haiti after the 2010 earthquake. “The beauty of this album is that we have broken the border between the First and the Third World, experiencing a sense of community & rdquor ;, highlights Browne, who sings in Spanish in a couple of issues with his Sevillian friend Raúl Rodríguez. Other collaborators in this mestizo work are the Malian Habib Koité and the Californian Jenny Lewis.
The collaboration with the former helmsman of Son de la Frontera, son of Martirio, fascinates him, because “Raúl is a musicologist, he has a great knowledge of different rhythms, and as a Spaniard he knows that African music, before arriving in the Caribbean , passed through Spain & rdquor ;. He likes to think that this work “will survive, like a capsule in time & rdquor ;, sighs Jackson Browne, who has seen his tour with James Taylor this summer and how other projects remain in limbo for now: a hypothetical staging of the Haitian album, the ‘tour’ of his new album … “There are plans on the table, but nothing is clear. At the moment, I’m trying to imagine it & rdquor ;.
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