Bit of a Blur

It has been almost a year now that I am completely absorbed by the music of Blur, the british rock/pop band.  I don't recall being interested in a band in this way and for this long; usually one listens an album a lot, finds some new stuff and moves on, and eventually revisits the old albums. Of course, not that I didn't know Blur:  I had a vague idea of their music, and I was aware of hits such as Song 2, Coffee and TV, and Girls and Boys. Back in 2002, I  had even bought and enjoyed their album Think Tank. However, it was only after watching their Glastonbury gig last year that I really got into Blur's music. I was in Grenoble and many things didn't seem to make sense, or so I thought.

So that concert really triggered something in me. I immediately got all of their albums, and read lots of information about them and the band. By now I have an awesome series of Blur-related memories. I would bike to/from work listening to Blur; that's at least one hour of music everyday. That's a lot of Blur. I remember walking in Paris, after doing visa-related bureaucracy, while singing Tender. I also remember walking around Kuala Lumpur, trying to forget about AH1N1 paranoia while listening The Great Escape over and over, and even singing He Thought of Cars (perhaps my favorite song in that album) in the fast train connecting KL and Putrajaya. During those days I would actually alternate between The Great Escape and Parklife, as I really like Tracy Jacks, London Loves, and most specially, Badhead, which was really amazing in the Glastonbury gig.

I find Blur's music intricately simple, as contradictory as this might sound. Lyrics are good (and sometimes brilliant) and in the music nothing appears as excessive or pretentious. What I probably appreciate the most is the fact that Blur as a band always cared to evolve, to push their creative boundaries, which is something I deeply admire in any music group. I find boring bands that always play the same song. Good examples of this desire of evolution in Blur's discography are 13 and Think Tank, the former aiming at exploring electronic music, and the latter being a good attempt of surviving without guitarist Graham Coxon (who left the band because of his problems with alcohol).

As you might guess, I haven't limited to listening and trying to make a high-level idea of their whole discography. I have tried to understand also the solo efforts by Graham Coxon and singer Damon Albarn. I recommend to everyone Coxon's The Spinning Top, a rather conceptual album that accompanied me during the first weeks in Grenoble (he has other albums, more Blur-like, but I haven't listened those yet). The obvious ramification of this exploratory strand is going through the music of Gorillaz, the amazing virtual band of Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. (Gorillaz deserves its own post, really.) The Good, The Bad, and The Queen, another effort by Albarn is warmly recommended, as I mentioned in this post.

Then it comes as no surprise that I've bought and watched several times No Distance Left To Run, a documentary of Blur's reunion last summer (see the official trailer). It is an extremely cool documentary: the story of the band is explained, including their up and downs, their fights and reconciliations. They appear as a group of friends, and the band reunion appears as a long postponed friends reconciliation. It is very well directed and I like it a lot. The DVD documentary comes with a recording of one of their gigs at Hyde Park; the concert is cool, but I like the Glastonbury gig better.

To conclude, these days I am reading Bit of a Blur, the autobiography of bassist Alex Jones. It is such an enjoyable reading; commuting time from/to my work here at Lisbon just flies reading that book. I am only at the beginning, though. Surprisingly, the book reveals that She's So High, one of my favorite songs from Blur, was the first song they ever wrote, at a time when they'd call themselves Seymour. She's So High is probably the simplest song ever (in fact, the lyrics are a little bit more than "I think of her / Everyday / I think of her / It doesn't help me") and yet it makes a great rock song. In fact, the Hyde park concert that appears in the DVD opens with a superb performance of She's So High. Do watch it here.

The End Is The Beginning Is The End

Some things come to an end without starting, or worse, without even existing. These are things that appear to be only because of our expectations or perceptions; they come to an end as soon as we realize they only make sense as the most enthusiastic of our desires. Then you realize that it was certainly nice while it lasted, especially when certain signals suggested the goal was possible. But once reality slaps you in the face, there is no other option but to accept that it is the end, that we have to move on.

The above is of course related to my disappointment after the recent Colombian presidential elections, which I have discussed before here, then here, and more recently, here. Disappointment comes from many different sources, but here I'd like to discuss only a few of them. As you probably know, elections were supposed to be a close competition between Antanas Mockus (the decent one), and Juan Manuel Santos (the despicable one). My first disappointment as a Mockus supporter was to see that Santos won with a huge difference (47% vs 21%, almost 7 million votes against little more than 3 million votes). While a Santos' victory in the first round was expected, such a difference shocked everyone. Moreover, Santos won in every state of the country but one, and also in the three main cities (Bogotá, Cali, Medellín) where Mockus was supposed to be fairly strong. 

A second source of disappointment was to realize that, once again, youngsters didn't go to vote. As I had mentioned here, people having the chance of voting for the first time would make a difference. There was a lot of hope on these kids, as they were supposed to support Mockus unconditionally. Well, it seems that they were too lazy to go to vote on a Sunday and now, partially because of them, the country will be fucked up for at least four more years. Once again, trusting the judgment of the so-called "new generations" has proven to be an idiotic ideal. 

The third disappointment was Mockus himself reacting to the results. We already knew that he isn't that good at speeches and public appearances. But the acceptance speech that he gave just after the results were revealed was absolutely disastrous, terrible, awful. For one, I couldn't watch it complete: I felt so disappointed to see Mockus unable to cheer up more than three million people who had voted for him. The paused style of Mockus when speaking, and his extremely pedagogic way of understanding public demonstrations, ruined the speech. I remember thinking "Mockus is not Obama", as Obama is quite clever at conveying the right emotional message, even if shallow and ephemeral, always at the right moment. What it was needed after a massive disappointment was a concrete, determined promise of fighting until the end for victory; an urgent call, to every single Colombian (and especially to those who didn't vote for him), to choose decency over traditional corruption. 

Of course, since Santos didn't manage to obtain more than 50% of the votes, there will be a second round elections (aka ballotage). To me it is clear that Mockus holds absolutely no chance in that round, especially because all other candidates but one, explicitly or implicitly, have adhered to Santos' campaign. So Santos will win, most likely with a larger difference. It is expected that less people will go to vote on June 20, either because they consider the elections are already settled (and hence their vote would make no difference) or because they think that the World Cup matches that day will be far more interesting (both Italy and Brasil play that day). From this point of view, it would be already "good" if Mockus manages to obtain the same votes he got in the first round. In fact, I would be extremely surprised if Mockus actually gets more votes. Sigh.

You might ask now, what is next for Colombia? In my view, these elections were about a fundamental question: do we want a shift towards a government based on decency, education, and social responsibility, or do we keep a government aiming at continuing with corruption, sustained war, and inequalities? As John McCain said in his concession speech, "the people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly." It is discouraging to realize that three million of decent people are the minority in Colombia. I hope Mockus' party is able to survive the second round with dignitiy, and that it articulates a proper opposition party right after the elections. Sadly, none of the two can be taken by granted.  

El Dorado

These days there is a controversy in Colombia concerning the name of the main airport of the country. In fact, the controversy arose because of a recent law which decrees that the airport of Bogotá should be called Luis Carlos Galán, in detriment of its current name: El Dorado. So you might wonder, what's with these names?

Let's begin by commenting on El Dorado. The associated wikipedia entry explains it reasonably well:

El Dorado (Spanish for "the golden one") is the name of a Muisca tribal chief who covered himself with gold dust and, as an initiation rite, dived into the lake Guatavita (near present day Bogota, Colombia). Later it became the name of a legendary "Lost City of Gold" that has fascinated - and so far eluded - explorers since the days of the Spanish Conquistadors. Imagined as a place, El Dorado became a kingdom, an empire, the city of this legendary golden king.

Hence, calling the main airport of the country El Dorado represents a way of remembering the Muiscas, one of the most remarkable native cultures that populated what nowadays is known as Colombia. (Notice that rather than having a huge, well-known native cultue ---such as the Aztecs in Mexico, or the Incas in Peru--- Colombia was populated by several smaller cultures. The Muiscas were one of them.) In fact, El Dorado feels like a connection to a glorious, prosperous past, a past that many Colombians ignore, do not completely appreciate, or simply despise. From this perspective, changing the name of the airport would mean losing one of our last connections to a significant part of our history.

But then you may ask, who was Luis Carlos Galán? Galán was a politician who was killed by the mafia in 1989 because of his strong positions against drug lords ---and the politicians representing them in the parliament. (Back then, mafia intended to take over the government through corrupt politicians. In fact, it is well known that it was a rival politician who convinced drug lord Pablo Escobar to order Galán's assassination.) Galán's death not only was a terrible crime in itself: it represented the death of the hope of a whole country who trusted him to clean up politics and shape a better future. As a vague analogy, back in 1989, Galán was able to convey the same hope and optimism as Obama did in the US. Everyone knew that Galán had enough popular support so as to be elected president in 1990. The drug lords knew that a "political infiltration" into a Galán government would not be possible, as he was too decent to allow that. So he was murdered on a Friday night, during a public act near Bogotá; I still remember the collective sadness of the following Saturday. I think it was the first crime I was able to understand---I was 6 back then.

Luis Carlos Galán (1943 - 1989)

[A digression here is in order: The 80s-early 90s were particularly tragic in Colombia's history. Galán was yet another one in the list of promising people killed by the so-called fuerzas oscuras (dark forces), that is, mafia often in collaboration with extreme right organizations. A whole generation of decent, bright Colombians was literally wiped out by the mafia during the 80s: judges, attorneys, police officers, ministers, left-wing leaders, journalists, presidential candidates such as Galán. Their crime was to denounce the truth about the danger of mafias, and/or to fight against their power and their role in the society.]

So we are talking about two very meaningful names in the Colombian culture. One represents our ancestral origins, a mystic link to our past and history. The second name represents the hope that couldn't be and most likely will never be. El Dorado is now such a traditional name for the airport, that changing it sounds so strange to me. I am of the opinion of leaving the name of the airport untouched; of course this doesn't mean that the ideals of Galán should ever die. Perhaps better than naming the airport after Galán, a more useful thing would be bringing his murderers into justice.

Season Summary

It is a good moment to review the 2009/2010 season of our beloved Real Madrid (RM). (After all, soon we will be busy with the World Cup.) The season was characterized by the arrival of a "new" president (Florentino Pérez, "my uncle" in what follows), yet additional evidence that Spanish sport media are disgusting, the lack of trophies at the end of the season, and uncertainty about the future.

My uncle arrived to the presidency of RM aiming at a complete revolution, and signed important names such as Cristiano Ronaldo (ManUtd), Kaká (Milan), Benzema (Olympique Lyon), and Xavi Alonso (Liverpool). Other, less renowned, players such as Albiol, Arbeloa, Granero, and Garay signed as well. The chosen manager was Chilean Manuel Pellegrini, who had done a rather good job in Villareal, during 2004-2009. My uncle's objective was to win again some trophies while playing attractively. The main goal of the season was to play the final of the UCL (UEFA Champions League) at the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium (RM home, in case you are not aware).

The season was a failure if one looks only at the final results: embarrassing performance at the Copa del Rey, a defeat full of impotence against Olympique Lyon in the UCL, and a second place in La Liga (the Spanish championship), just behind our sworn enemy. Beyond these disappointing results, in my opinion the team managed to have an idea of how to play, something that is remarkable in the light of the game shown in previous seasons. Moreover, the team did excellent at home (only one, yet crucial and painful, defeat), and some records were broken. The defense was particularly solid, even if Pepe was not available during many games. This is probably the most notable achievement of Pellegrini's team. Unfortunately, midfield and attack lines weren't that regular: although Xabi Alonso had an acceptable performance during the season, the ones supposed to make the team play (Guti, Granero, and perhaps Gago) were rather disappointing. Substitutes for Xabi Alonso (Lass and Mahamadou Diarra) were quite irregular too. The notable news in the attack is that legendary captain Raúl was officially sent to the bench during most of the season, and thus the strikers of the team were Cristiano Ronaldo and my personal favorite, Gonzalo El Pipita Higuaín. This was an awesome season for Pipita (27 goals in 35 appearances in La Liga), despite of the fact that my uncle doesn't like him very much (he prefers shy and unenthusiastic Benzema instead). Pipita scored important goals, was able to overcome the pressure of a lot of bad press against him, and yet again showed that he is the most reliable striker of the team, with a fantastic future ahead (he's just 22).

My uncle of course wasn't very happy at the end of the season with these results. In spite of his previous promises, he has recently fired Pellegrini. I liked Pellegrini a lot: apart from a questionable line-ups at the beginning of the season, you could tell he had a clear idea of how to make the team play for victory. Also, he's a gentleman: during the season he never gave a controversial press conference, always showing decency and culture. Pellegrini's plans for the team were seriously affected as soon as Robben and Sneijder left the team during the preseason (to Bayern Munich and Inter FC, respectively). This occurred even if Pellegrini publicly declared both players were essential in his plans; my uncle didn't appreciate such declarations, and claimed that their transfers were financially crucial. Robben and Sneijder's performances with their new teams (as well as RM's lack of options in the wings) would prove Pellegrini right, at the end.

Another disappointment of the season was Kaká. He had both adaptation and physical problems; a mysterious injury affected him during a large part of the season. However, in the games in which he supposedly was in good shape, he made no difference in the attack of the team. Luckily, whenever Kaká wasn't available or was playing like crap, there was Van der Vaart to play in his position. Van der Vaart did great in some games, but he also had injury problems towards the end of the season.

The last part of the season was characterized by a disgusting media campaign against Pellegrini. While at some point it was hard to believe my uncle would dare to fire him, thus contradicting the opinion of many followers, the intensity of such a campaign eventually convinced us that Pellegrini was out. What a shame. Decent and modest Pellegrini was then replaced by controversial José Mourinho, who has been very successful in Portugal, England, and more recently Italy. My uncle claimed that a change of coach was necessary in order to bring more leadership into the team.

Mourinho's teams tend to be more effective than attractive; it is unclear how he will adapt to Spanish football. He is certainly a guy who enjoys controversy; he says he does so in order to protect his players from unnecessary pressure. I am afraid that RM will be more hated now that Mourinho is leading the team. Mourinho has said that he wants 3 or 4 defensive players. While this could make some sense (given the current weaknesses in the wing positions) the reliability of the defense during this season makes me doubt about this. RM might need to get rid of good players (such as Garay or Albiol), in favor of people Mourinho knows well, such as Inter's Maicon. Perhaps it is just Mourinho trying to impose his new authority above all. Let's see how it goes.