Gracefully-ageing rockers

A pleasant few days of a summertime trip from Bilbao down to see Manu Chao in concert in Burgos. 

Manu Chao in Burgos 

The Venue-Sala Andén, Burgos

Our concert venue is a lovely old repurposed railway building in the city of Burgos, which you can see a bit more of here. The place has good acoustics and enough bars with reasonable prices to keep the concert-goers happy. It also has a good bar outside, on the side of the building. Here you can appreciate the remains of the old railway, and a play park installed for kids, if the young ones are coming along with you. 

Manu Chao and his origins

Manu Chao's family origins are in the Basque Country around Bilbao, and Galicia. They moved to Paris however, as a result of the Spanish Civil War and he grew up there, surrounded by artists and performers who his journalist father knew. As a professional artist, he kicked off his career with various groups involving friends and family members in the mid-1980s. This culminated in the group Mano Negra, or Black Hand in English, lasting from the late 1980s until the mid-90s. The group was fairly successful in Europe and Latin America and toured quite a bit. His solo career, from the late 1990s onwards has been fairly much the same in terms of geography. He has been less successful and gets a lot less credit than he deserves in English-speaking countries, though he has played on occasion in the US. 

Styles and genres

His music is multi-lingual, mainly in Spanish and French but he sings in a variety of other languages. The music is also a mixture of various global styles, from rock to ska, to more traditional elements from world culture. This fusion, with various other sounds and voices in his studio recordings, give listeners the impression of raw street performances. You feel as if you are standing outside, listening to talented musicians brandishing their instruments in impromptu performances. His lyrics are also unashamedly and proudly of the common folk. He sings of international multi-culture and of reaching out our hands in friendship to our global family. This all adds to a style that never wanted to get too polished, and wants to maintain the fun. His crowds join in with the singing, and enjoy the general good craic of guitars getting pulled out for jolly old singalongs. 

Manu Chao in Concert

The concert itself is energetic and noisy, and full of some of the oldest swingers in town, including us. Remember that the performer has been around for a good few years, so the age demographic is upwards of the mid-forties and into the fifties. However, there is a fair smattering of young ones here too, so his music and its message is getting through to new generations. 

I do feel a bit like I'm in the old San Mamés stadium, formerly in Bilbao, as there is a big wooden pillar midway across the stage. This was a common complaint of the Athletic Bilbao fans and thankfully not a problem in the new stadium. The pillar is holding the lights up thankfully, though it gives me neck pains from head crank. I'm fairly close to the speakers too, so several days of ear ringing lie ahead for me. My last concert was Public Enemy in 2013 at the Bilbao fiestas. That was outside along the river, so the sound escaped into the sky. This time, the sonics are trapped, but I'm happy. 

Masters of the ceremony

Whenever they come on, the crowd goes mad and it seems the band aren't far off the crowd's mood either. A full two and a half hours lie ahead and you have to respect them for their effort. Manu Chao is now into his sixties and is still giving it everything in his live performances. He, his barefoot percussionist and the guitarist would need to have the energy of professional sportspeople for this kind of thing, and the sweat lashes off them. It lashes off me too, just watching them! 

Whenever the music finally comes to an end, he shakes all of our hands on the front row, stays on stage and continues as master of ceremonies, keeping the audience going. There's a bit of a mini-disco with quite a few Bob Marley numbers, which is always a good sign. Off we go finally, handing in our plastic fiesta beer glasses and getting our €uro deposit back, doing our bit for the environment and the clean streets of Burgos. 

Should you go to see Manu Chao, even if you haven't really heard of him?

Yes, and absolutely! And go even if you don't speak French, which I don't, or Spanish, or any other language he seems to be able to speak. The man's an artistic polyglot and you have such a diverse fusion of languages, musical styles and cultural awareness going on while the common touch never disappears. 

Give him a listen at his YouTube channel here, if you love the world and its sounds, you won't be disappointed. And any age can join in.