Jaume Sisa: "No one bothered me, and I couldn't make a living from music."

BarcelonaHow many truly indisputable albums has Catalan pop music produced in the last fifty years? You can count them on the fingers of one hand—or both, if we're being generous. No one would dare to doubt that Diopter nor its significance. Nor is the transversal explosion ofThe best European teachers. Nor of course of For my friend, To alenar either Happiness. Have them, but few. We could dedicate an entire journal to detailing the reasons, but the fact is that when one of them turns fifty, the celebration should be worthy of it. This year marks the album's first half-century. Any night the sun can rise, by Sisa, the galactic artist, the star counter, the astronomical musician whose life was changed by this album. And, in the process, it also changed the future of the country's music.

Let's put ourselves in 1975, Franco's death was just a few months away, although the young had long since surpassed him. The magazine Ajoblanco had been published for weeks, Zeleste was already open, the first Canet Rock would be released in the summer, and names like Orquesta Platería, Pau Riba, Ia & Batiste, Oriol Tranvía, and Sisa himself formed a new generation born from the underground with the idiosyncrasy of wanting to cleanse themselves of the past. It was the time of the counterculture. "It was a moment of effervescence that didn't last too long, that of the surrealist underground," recalls Jordi Batista of Máquina and Ia & Batiste. A decade earlier, Els Setze Jutges had revitalized the Catalan scene and politicized it, but in the 1970s, it was the turn of a new generation, marked by the change of decade, revolutionary airs, and the dazzling appearance of the Diopter, by Pau Riba. "They breathed an air of freedom, and it didn't have a strictly musical explanation, but rather a political one," explains Joaquim Vilarnau of the magazine Enderrock.

As with almost all good things, they initially moved on the margins, before reaching the general public: "We were inconsequential on the radio and you heard yourself as a minority, but it was your minority. People listened to Serrat, La Trinca, Manolo Escobar." But it was evident that something had changed: "The scene must have been at a mature and playful point. They had already translated the Anglo-Saxon influences and sought out the roots of Catalan folklore to start looking in other directions," refines promoter Quique Ramos.

In this context, Sisa did not quite take off. A son of Poble-sec and with serious vision problems from the cradle - he added 25 diopters in each eye - the singer went through the Grup de Folk and debuted solo in 1968, at 20 years old. On the cover he sported an extraordinary Afro mane, but what was inside was even better, The drawn man. Even today, it's a major calling card, a song that's both surreal and infectious, an openly pop debut that began to put Sisa in her place. But only in terms of transcendence, something incomprehensible when heard with five decades' perspective. Some time later, in 1971, her first LP would arrive, Orgy, which also didn't take off. "I was very high, for a young man, but at the same time very low, because I felt like a failure and marginalized. No one paid attention to me and I couldn't make a living from music, which was what I wanted," explains Sisa, who had accepted a normal job at an insurance company. And then came Any night the sun can rise, the disc.

The best studio in Barcelona

That album was the final straw, and it turned out well. "I had assumed that maybe I should just play for myself and my friends," the singer explains today. The main reason he decided to return to the recording studio to try again was Rafael Moll, who, along with Víctor Jou, both responsible for Zeleste, had just opened his own label within Edigsa, the record label responsible for Joan Manuel Serrat, La Trinca, and Ovidi Montllor, among others. The instrumentation was primarily provided by Sisa himself and pianist Jordi Vilaprinyó, while Moll was the producer, years before working with names like Gato Pérez and El Último de la Fila. Any night the sun can rise It was recorded at the Gema2 studio on Sardenya Street, which at the time was one of the best in Barcelona. "It had a huge room that could fit an eighty-person orchestra. I remember the owner was a very nice Andalusian named Ortiz, who also worked as a bullfighter and who didn't understand anything I was doing. Nor was he interested," Sisa recalls.

On May 3, 1975, the twelve-inch record was released in Barcelona. At Zeleste, of course. "I didn't feel like I'd done anything special or extraordinary. It was more of a phenomenon that grew over time." So much so that it has become legendary. The album was the result of an ambitious mix of genres, in which spaces Sisa had already explored—singer-songwriter, folk—were found. Dylanian– with modernity – progressive rock – and which brilliantly blended the psychedelic orchestra with a certain symphonic spirit. That cocktail resulted in a triple E: unbeatable, irresistible, and unrepeatable. "It represents a unique fusion of various elements of Catalan culture and counterculture of the 70s. It's a magical, very personal, poetic universe that musically blends many things," says singer-songwriter Ivette Nadal.

"I have no idea why it worked so well. It was so addictive and I still don't fully understand the reasons why," explains Sisa. It's not an excessive album, unlike the Diopter, which came out in two parts. This one was short, with only eight songs. From the beginning, with The teacher's son, in the end, Any night the sun can rise, there was a continuous demonstration of Sisa's brilliant narrative and poetic ability. The exploration of a magical, naive, playful, and surreal world, navigating through fantasy and tenderness, gazing at the stars from an apartment in Poble-sec. "Everything is reflected. Sisa has a galactic vision in which you can understand the Universe from something very small, that an instant in a life could be like an eternity," says writer Miqui Otero.

Today, and with his legacy in perspective, it is very easy to recognize the genius of this album, but at the time there were already those who realized that it was not a good LP like any other, but that it was superior: "I realize that I am before an important album, if it does not opt for an individual poetic, but the precarious affirmation of a fragile self among an insufficient us," he wrote in The Country Manuel Vázquez Montalban.

A galactic footprint

As important as Highway 61 Revisited for American music. Just as influential here as the Rubber Soul in the United Kingdom. In terms of heritage, the imprint of Any night the sun can rise In the Països Catalans, it's incalculable. "I see that there are bands from today who may have heard me. Besides, I really like them," says Sisa when Manel or La Ludwig Band are mentioned. There's also, of course, the astronomical connection with Antònia Font, heirs to that of wandering among the stars, such as Albert Pla, Quimi Portet, and El Petit de Cal Eril, because if anyone in that country invented metaphysical pop, it's precisely him: "It's beautiful that someone who comes from the bottom is the one who artistically has reached so high. Sisa is the myth."

The reality is that the list of bands that have acknowledged his influence is rich and full. From Joan Colomo to Mishima, Tarta Relena, Joan Garriga, and Maria Rodés. Some participated in the tribute dedicated to him in July 2022, coinciding with the day that Barcelona City Council announced that it would award him the Gold Medal for Cultural Merit.

The examples of this album's enormous legacy within Catalan popular culture are incontestable. There's a website for current music called Any night, a name that's not at all coincidental. And a major campaign to welcome refugees was called Casa Nostra Casa Vostra. It's not a coincidence either. A wonderful psychedelic indie folk duo from Vic had the same name as the third song on the album, Brother Air. "I remember finding a cassette of my mother at home and putting it in the Walkman, somewhere between the Ramones and Lou Reed. When I first heard it, I thought there was something really interesting about our culture," recalls Luca Masseroni, singer of Germà Aire, who is currently inactive after three excellent albums. 'A reissue, to be published by the Satélite K label this winter and consisting of a limited edition of 250 albums with a new remastered version, Ivette Nadal is preparing a show that will premiere at the Barnasants, Ivette Nadal sings to the galacticos, in which he will reinterpret the universe of Sisa and Riba.

Jaume Sisa has never seen himself too well, nor was he apparently aware of the magnitude of what he had done when he recorded this album, but the fact is that he opened a door that has remained wide open for half a century. "Along with Pau Riba, he has been our Dylan. He has made a postcard of each phrase," says Joaquim Vilarnau. Fortunately, his journey did not end in 1975, because behind The drawn man and Any night the sun can rise Other albums and amazing songs would come: Cathedral, The Night of San Juan, The Magic of the Student, Sick of Heaven or her collaboration with Melodrama. And many others. You'll never get enough of Sisa.