Review Summary: What do your ideals matter? / What does your song matter? / The fat of the capitals cover your heart
Serú Girán – La Grasa de las Capitales (1979)
Serú Girán was an argentinian supergroup created in the year 1978, by Charly GarcÃ*a, David Lebón, Pedro Aznar and Oscar Moro. It is considered as one of the greatest and most influential argentinian bands of all time, due to the quality of their music and the huge cultural impact they had.
La Grasa de las Capitales is their sophomore, LP released in the middle of a dictatorship, that after the awful reception that their self-titled álbum received, the band managed to change it’s image with a much more direct, contestatoty and aggressive style. They got rid of the orchestral arrangements that were so critizised on the previous release and decided to go a little more conventional instrumentally, while on the execution it turned out to be an absolutely innovative record. The LP contestatory style of the album is noticeable directly from it’s cover: a parody against the papparazzi and frivolous magazines like the popular Gente, that would also take part on some of the lyrics, taking also the society itself as a topic on some tracks.
The title track opens the record, with an amazing choir singing one of the phrases that sums up the direction that GarcÃ*a intended to take: What do your ideals matter? / What does your song matter? / the fat of the capitals cover your heart. With those words Serú Girán declares a war against media, going against the mediocrity that Charly hated so much. San Francisco y el Lobo is a beautiful ballad composed by GarcÃ*a and Lebón and sung by him that talks about the legend of Francis de Assisi. The album goes on with the amazing tracks Perro Andaluz and Frecuencia Modulada where both Charly and Lebón takes on the society from two different perspectives: the first one talks about a deceptive relationship (You treat me like a friend when you’re around me / But when you’re with another you destroy me) that could relate with this kind of war they declared to the media; while the other track talks about how music doesn’t have the same feeling as before (If there’s no life in the music you listen to / If the lyrics no longer have inspiration / If even increasing the volumen there’s no force / It’s the times that are hollow with emotion). Then we have Viernes, 3AM, one of the most amazing tracks ever recorded wrote about suicide by a person who did not commit suicide, simply a touching and incredible sad song that tells us the last minutes of our protagonist as it takes his own life. Noche de Perros and Los Sobrevivientes are two amazing tracks: the first one talks about loneliness, with beautiful lyrics and an amazing atmosphere, while Los Sobrevivientes talks about how people, despite all their changes, still remains the same, or on another level, talks about exile in times of dictatorship. The eighth track is the worst on the record, but still a pretty good track: the only song composed by Pedro Aznar on the entire record, that talks directly about how he felt about the dictatorship, how difficult it was to get stuff done when you knew that anytime the government could make you disappear. The last track on the album is Canción de Hollywood, where Charly talks about how Hollywood is hollow, fake and empty, closing the record with a beautiful song.
Over the whole album, the four members of the group play on a superb level: from that amazing, almost Queen choir that opens the record, they never stop showing their amazing skills, while not actually showing off. Moro can accommodate to any rythm or tempo their bandmates require, while Aznar with his fretless bass guitar devises amazing and creative lines that work impressively with the drums. Lebón on guitar and vocals on some tracks makes a wonderful job, while Charly also singins and playing piano the way only he knows how to, leaves some of the best compositions of his career.
I don’t have nothing bad to say about this record, I think it is one of the best records ever.
Favorite tracks: Frecuencia Modulada, Canción de Hollywood, Noche de Perros.
Charly GarcÃ*a: keys and vocals
David Lebón: guitar and vocals
Pedro Aznar: bass guitar and vocals
Oscar Moro: drums
This is my first review, and it's not even on my mother tonge (spanish) so if you have something to say I could work on, it would be great to read about it!
