It has not been a conscious reflection, but in Caminando, Rubén Blades (Panama City, 1948) has been looking a lot at the past and less at the future. The king of salsa has come out with an electrifying but nostalgic record. Of the first thing it is the fault that powerful big band, led by Roberto Delgado, with which it has recorded and next to that undertakes tour. Of the second, the years … It does not mean all this that the author of Pedro Navaja, referring to the Latin music urbi et orbi, has become a melancholic. Rather look at the world with the same intensity as before. He continues his career as an actor – he now recorded episodes of the series Fear the Walking Dead -, faces a tour that will bring him on July 17 by Madrid in the Nights of the Botanic and four other Spanish cities until July 22, but above all , does not shy away from questions about hot topics about Trump, Venezuela, or those mortgages that were once signed by musicians of their generation with record companies and who made them pay for their freedom. Now he is in the mood with Nicolás Maduro, who attacked him in one of those fasciotelevisivos shows in which he threatens people.
Question. What happened to Nicolás Maduro? He has taken it with you.
Answer. In Venezuela the intransigence of Maduro’s government is leading his country to the cliff of violence. May you reconsider, for the sake of your people. I have worried about the situation of chaos, but also about how the population distrusts some sectors of the opposition for fear of leading them to situations of corruption like those of the past. I suggest to anyone who really wants to understand my position on Venezuela to enter my website to read my answer and, also, all the articles that since 2014 I have written about the situation in the country. The present situation reaffirms the need for new elections, whose integrity is confirmed through the impartial supervision of international credit observers and institutions.
Q. This record smells of nostalgia. Is it a sought-after path?
Why did a lot of women choose to vote for a liar, misogynist, charlatan, and ignorant, not Hillary Clinton? ”
A. I am in the process of re-recording some of my songs since the record houses I have contracted with are the masters of my master albums. It is unfair that companies like Sony, Elektra or Universal, although recover the investment in each launch, remain the owners. It’s like you go to a bank, they give you a loan but the entity still owns your house. A multinational that does not sing, or arrange, does not write sheet music, does not compose or play an instrument ends up as owner and the creative musician, who fucks. It is not a question of going back to the past. Unlike. I go to the future because I recover my music and I can manage it in life to leave as an inheritance when I die. I plan to re-record everything for that.