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AN
INTERVIEW WITH MANU CHAO
By Peter Culshaw
Manu Chao manages to marry various contradictions – a huge star,
for this week anyway with his new album, La Radiolina, the best selling
pop star in South America and Europe (although not in the U.K. yet),
but someone who also manages to be a radical man of the people. He plays
to 100,000 people in Mexico City, but then will play concerts for striking
dockers, indigenous people or simply in small bars. While other albums
in the works include producing an album by the son of the Malian blind
couple Amadou and Mariam (Manu produced their bestselling and brilliant
album Dimanche A Bamako) and another with the inmates of a mental asylum
in Buenos Aires called La Colifata, he also tells me when I meet him
he will produce an album he is calling his “Brasilian” album.
Manu was born in Paris – his parents are Spanish from Galicia
and the Basque country – and his music reflects his background.
I met him in his local bar in the gothic area of Barcelona where he strummed
on his beaten up guitar several numbers of the so-called Brasilian disc,
with lyrics in Portunhol – a mix of Spanish and Portuguese that
Manu uses when in Brasil, which he often is.
“Rio is the best city in the world” he says, “it’s
the only city in the world you can wander into a bar at midnight banging a
drum and they get upset when you stop”. It was in Rio that Manu came
to recuperate after the break-up of his seminal French punk band Manu Negra.
He says he was depressed, “even suicidal” when a cow walked into
his favourite bar: “I looked into the cow’s eyes and saw such tranquillity
and serenity it really helped me”. Then he started seeing cows everywhere
and says he understands why the Hindus worship the animals: “India is
calling me. I will go one day – I will need it.” These days he
even has cows’ eyes on his tour jacket.
Manu loves the other music of Rio – the baile funk of the favelas;
the chorinho bars of Lapa; the forro at the Sao Cristobal market. He’s
not one to do the 5 star Copacabana holiday most big stars might do,
and is often in the favelas. The violence there is something, he says,
that stirs the anger of his lyrics (see tracks like Rainin In Paradize on
La Radiolina). “I’ve been in the favelas and heard a guy
being tortured and screaming “Please Kill Me”, and there’s
nothing I can do about it.”
When I tell him I like São Paulo as much as Rio he says “Because
I didn’t under the city I spent hours one night after a show just
walking across the city for hours in the middle of the night, just talking
to people like the child prostitutes.” He still prefers Rio. “I’m
the guitar player of the neighbourhood – the old guys don’t
know I’m Manu Chao, I just sing for them for hours and hours in
the neighbourhood bar.”
He has also been to the World Social Forum when it was in Porto Alegre: “I
was camping there and it was very interesting – I met people from
Bolivia, Mexico, Peru and Brasil, people from everywhere. I really liked
the energy. It gave me hope – it was something positive.” People
are always trying to get Manu more involved in politics: “I prefer
to be a citizen. We don’t need leaders – we need everyone
to be a leader.”
Close to his heart is Fortaleza in Ceara where his son lives with his
mother. “I was in Rio and this guy asked if I was from Ceara because
of my accent I was quite proud.” He loves the music of the North-East
too. He mentioned travelling around with the Repentistas, the local troubadours,
living on nothing much more than cachaça. Does he like Luis Gonzaga? – “Of
course, he’s the Bob Marley of the North East. First thing when
you are from Ceara you must know the music of Luis Gonzaga” – Manu
starts singing a Gonzaga song about water irrigation and about how for
ten years there’s been a drought.
He also said to me he’d been initiated as a son of Xango, in the
religion of Candomblé by a Mae de Santos in Bahia. As it happens
the last time I saw him playing to an ecstatic audience in Brooklyn’s
Prospect Park, one of the worst storms for years broke out, the crowd
were drenched and the thunder shook the air. As Xango is associated with
thunder, I mentioned to him that maybe Xango was in the house that night
and he agreed. The storm didn’t damp the audience’s spirits
though – they kept singing along to Proxima Estacion- Esperanza
(Next Station Hope- a name he got from a Madrid underground station and
the name of his last studio album)- and Manu represents a kind of hope
for many people, such as the increasing numbers dissatisfied with the
North American hegemony and the policies of George Bush (which he sings
about on La Radiolina on Tristeza Maleza – with some of the mental
patients from La Colifata singing along). He manages to be political
without lecturing or being worthy and dull. Fiesta Politics.
We also talked a bit about the Amazon – Manu is fascinated with
shamans: “I have met many shamans – not all of them said
they were.” He’s increasingly interested in healing “If
I was not doing music I would like to learn how to heal with my hands.”
For Manu Brasil represents another vision of America than the United
States. For all the troubles in Brasil, I suggest, at least you don’t
get suicide bombers or students massacring fellow students “I know
what you mean – there’s a kind of sanity in Brasil.”
Brasil is not a country says Manu, but a continent, “it’s
a lot of different countries, you know. I love this country.”
La
Radiolina
Because Music
£8.98 (at Amazon.co.uk)
read the review of this album on the poster inside this issue
myspace.com/manuchao
REVIEW
Manu Chao – La Radiolina
Words: Erika Tambke
After a six year hiatus, Manu Chão hás
finally released La
Radiolina. The success of his previous albums, “Clandestino” (1998)
in particular, won the French artist a legion of fans and he has gone
on to perform sell-out tours without even releasing any new material.
Despite being relatively unknown in the UK (and US), Manu Chao is a
major figure across the world. Robbie Williams and Lilly Allen have
both covered his songs, for example.
Despite such a long
wait for new material, when you hear La Radiolna,
the first impression is one of dejá-vu. The songs are all similar
and sound like tracks off his previous CDs. Coming from a socially engaged
artist like Manu Chao, this is something of a disappointment. Politically,
things have moved on since 1999, and this doesn’t translate in
his lyrics. Musically, the artist has travelled across the world in search
of new sounds and influences, working as a producer on Malian duo Amadou
and Mariam’s excellent album. But on La Radiolina, it
seems as if the world was just the same today as it was six years
ago. He hasn’t even changed.
However, there are a few tracks that
suggest a return to a more guitar-based sound and to his punk-à-la_The
Clash roots. There are 21 tracks, but the majority are less than two
minutes long. Fans of Mano Negra will be pleased to hear that that the
album includes the bonus tracks The Bleeding Clown, Raining in Paradize,
El Hoyo and Panik Panik.
Other tracks are a good example of the
album’s eclectic style:
the opening song “13 dias” includes a country-influenced
guitar riff that sounds like it was swiped straight off the Mexican border. “Me
Llamen Calle” is melodic, mixing flamenco rhythms with interesting
lyrics, and is definitely a stand-out track. “La vida tombola” is
about Maradona and has a South American vibe. In other words, there’s
something for everyone.
Long-time fans will like the album. If you’ve
never heard Manu Chao before, it’s worth a listen because his sound
is very original. His music has influenced a lot of the bands playing
in London at the moment. If the music keeps his word, this will be his
last-ever CD. From now on, he’ll only be releasing singles online.
Manu
UK tour dates
5 Oct - 19:30
London: Carling Academy Brixton
7 Oct - 19:00
Bristol: Carling Bristol Academy
8 Oct - 19:30
Manchester: Apollo
10 Oct - 19:30
Glasgow: Carling Academy
7 Nov -19:00
Nottingham: Rock City