Gorillaz triumphs with its resplendent 'in memoriam' at Primavera Sound

BarcelonaAlthough the britpop war with Oasis has condemned Damon Albarn to always be the-singer-of-Blur in the collective imagination, the fact is that his parallel project, Gorillaz, has much more following, or at least that's what the 40.8 million monthly followers on Spotify suggest, compared to Blur's 14.4 million. The main stage of this Saturday's Primavera Sound made it clear that this experiment of creating a musical collective with a reduced ego and that visually expresses itself through Jamie Hewlett's drawings has been a complete success: the esplanade known as Mordor overflowed with an audience that wanted to join Albarn's particular proposal.

Gorillaz also came to present a peculiar album. The mountain is the result of a spiritual journey to India after both Albarn and Hewlett lost close family members. What makes it special, beyond the use of traditional Indian instrumentation, are the multiple collaborations of deceased people who had collaborated on the project at some point. From discarded snippets, new songs have been made that were showcased on Saturday. For example, Mark E. Smith, the leader of The Fall, was heard again, this time at Primavera Sound with the song Delirium. Singer Asha Bhosle was able to record her participation while alive, but she passed away last month, at the age of 92, so when they performed the luminous The shadowy light with her recorded part, an emotional tribute was paid to her.

Despite this backdrop of death, neither the album nor its live incarnation had a funereal tone, but rather the vibrant notes of acceptance and celebration. Surprisingly, this latest collection of songs, more reflective and meditative, combined well with the more festive, danceable, and singalong wardrobe staples. Rhinestone eyes, Stylo or Clint Eastwood even electrified the spectators furthest from the stage. Little Simz, who had performed her concert a while earlier, took the opportunity to join the party and sing Garage Palace, which the band had not yet premiered live.

With this show, Damon Albarn is definitively growing up. This is a mature show, although from time to time you can sense that mischievous look he had when he confined himself to English indie with Blur and jumped to whatever you wanted in the video for Song 2Last year, the Irish played in front of a sparse crowd of a thousand people at Sala ApoloFeel Good Inc. If anyone saw a Mr. Scrooge leaving in a hurry, know that it was only professional duty.

Because at three o'clock Kneecap started on the other side of the venue. The Irish played last year in front of a scarce thousand people at Sala Apolo, as they recalled, so they saw it as a success to have decupled their audience in such a short time. The responsible is the second studio album from this trio, which again combines strong political messages with techno beats full of tension and threat. The title of the work, Fenian, is a pejorative term that unionists used to refer to Catholics, but the band reclaims it precisely to reverse its negative connotation and recover the original meaning of the word, which designated a legendary warrior from national mythology.

Irish complicity

With all this context, it's not hard to understand that Kneecap opened the concert with an unequivocal “Long live Catalonia!” on stages where most of the time it hasn't gone beyond some “Houla Espanyia!”. And, as if it weren't clear enough, the traditional balaclava with the colors of the Irish flag that DJ Próvaí usually wears when firing his beats during the first few minutes had the yellow and red of the senyera. Towards the end of the performance, they even let out a “Fuck Spain”, but immediately said it was a joke, that they didn't want trouble, and that they'd had enough: Mo Chara, one of the singers, was accused of glorifying terrorism for having taken out a Hezbollah flag at a concert in London. He was acquitted and the experience was captured in the song Carnival, which wasn't played on Saturday. It's not recorded that the Court has taken any action, in any case, for outrage of any kind.

Just like with Gorillaz, there was also a courtesy visit: that of Grian Chatten, from compatriots Fontains DC, to sing Better way to live

together. And that of the son of Marwan Barghouti, known as the Palestinian Mandela, imprisoned during the second intifada and who has been confined for 24 years, in this case for an exhortation to continue defending the right of Palestinians to live. Songs like Get your brits out, H.O.O.D, or Smugglers & Scholars were some of the most celebrated songs.

The warm coldness of The xx

In a very different register, zero hysterical and much more chill, The xx sounded clean and crystalline again on the marine platform. The merit of the band of Romy Madley Croft, Oliver Sim and Jamie Smith is to use a very limited palette of colors and sounds, but nevertheless to keep growing a catalog of these delicate miniatures with prominent bass. Despite the minimalism, the velvety voices, both hers and his, transmit a very particular warmth. Crystalised, Say something loving, Islands and Angels opened the recital and set a very welcome tone to cleanse the palate before and after other much denser musical proposals. A glass of ice-cold still water, which someone places in your hands just when you need a fresh sip.