Rigoberta Bandini: “No, I'm not from Opus. I stick my boobs out at all the concerts!”

First it was the mother, then the boobs, and now the baby.

The circle of life.

The boy's name is Nico and he is two years old.

He is the son of Rigoberta Bandini, the author of

that song of feminine pride that talks about breasts, broth in the fridge and courage and that has become a hymn that even children in Early Childhood Education sing.

Paula Ribó (Barcelona, ​​32 years old, real name of Rigoberta Bandini) finally launches (October 7) her first album.

For three years she has been putting out single songs and now she packs them up.

which is the name of the album, includes four completely new songs and eight already well-known ones (among them hits like

or

Of the unpublished ones, two dedicated to his son emerge.

In one of them,

he sings: “May the men of this new world cry in peace”.

The artist explains it on Thursday afternoon in a Madrid hotel cafeteria: "I see my father's generation, who is 70, a little self-conscious, who has a hard time expressing themselves, because of that shit that has been broadcast about what crying is of soft.

That is in the DNA of those of that generation.

What I wish for my son is that he cry in peace, that he stop shitting himself.

His father [Esteban Navarro, 37 years old, his creative right-hand man], is from another generation and cries a lot.

But it is true that emotional openness is more linked to women.

As a mother, I would like my son to take ownership of that, because he is much healthier than the other.

I say this because he was born with male genitalia and if he is finally a man, then it may be that he does not want to be a man”.

To protect myself, I call myself [dick].

What makes me calm is that people who really know me know that I'm quite 'punk'.

I have little dick.

But yes, sometimes they have called me dick… Well, there are worse things”

Rigoberta Bandini has arrived in the capital for a trip of a few hours with the aim of recording a video with C. Tangana that will serve as a promotion for

.

She has come alone: ​​without representative or family.

The artist has been a Spanish pop star for just over a year.

Actress, voice actor and writer, she founded the Rigoberta Bandini project in 2019 and edited songs like

or

.

Unprejudiced pop music, a good voice, ingenious and intelligent lyrics and a great ability to connect with both passing audiences and connoisseurs.

Live, theatricality and fun.

At the end of 2021,

Benidorm Fest and all the rest already known for those who have lived in Spain last season.

“I felt uncomfortable with what happened after the Benidorm Fest final [people faced two models: theirs, a feminist, and Chanel's, supposedly not so feminist], because they created an enmity that does not exist.

Chanel and I are not the best of friends, although she could write to him for a beer.

She is a person I have a lot of affection for and a professional like the top of a pine tree.

We are simply different types of artist.

But they used us because we are women.

This politicization does not add up to much.”

The singer, posing in Madrid.

Louis Sevillano

The Catalan artist offers a fluid and varied conversation.

She speaks the same about her musical references (“Serrat, Silvio Rodríguez, Abba, Franco Battiato… and contemporary artists such as the Belgian Angèle, C. Tangana or Rosalía”) than about a breast reduction operation she underwent when she was 20 years: “The normal thing now is to put on your chest, but not take it off.

And there is an interesting debate there.

In my case it was because they grew when I was very small and the breasts quickly sexualized me.

Inside she was a girl, but outside she was an object of desire.

There I felt a very strong hatred towards my own body, but that was not my fault: it was the fault of the people who made me feel that my body was made to be eaten, and that it was theirs, not mine.

At that time it was very good for me to have surgery.

She is shocked to hear the news from the journalist of multiple women's accusations of Arcade Fire singer Win Butler for sexual misconduct.

She says that he would not go to a concert of someone who was so suspicious.

In this context, the singer Zahara has recently commented on the

website : “The day Me Too exists in Spanish music, there will be no festival that can last”.

Bandini: “I haven't had any unpleasant experiences, it catches me at a more mature age.

But what Zahara says is strong.

Subtle harassment is very normalized.

And it is in all areas, not only in music.

It's true that I don't now, but when I look back my life is full of unpleasant micro-experiences.

And the sum of these

is what makes it problematic.

And that's bullshit."

Ask.

Does it bother you to be called dick?

Response.

I already call it myself to protect myself.

What gives me peace of mind is that people who really know me know that I'm pretty

I have little dick.

But yes, sometimes I've been called a dick... Well, there are worse things.

P.

I suppose they mean that he is from a wealthy family and that is why everything has been easier for him.

R.

I am from a middle class family, maybe upper-middle class.

My parents have worked all their lives.

My mother is a music teacher at a school and is still there;

my father worked in my grandfather's company, which later closed... I have not experienced a feeling of "my life is solved".

Absolutely.

I've been dubbing movies since I was six years old and I've never asked my parents for a euro.

I have always maintained.

I have not lived in precariousness, that is true, and I give thanks.

But from there to being a marchioness, either.

Q.

How do you position yourself socially?

A.

Progressive.

I like the social policies of progress, of advancing.

In a talk Manuela Carmena told me: "You always have to move forward with an anchor in the past."

In other words, you can't go crazy.

There are things in the tradition that are not bad, and that is a learning that I have done in maturity.

As a child I was more

You have to have an anchor in preserving something from the past, but with a step always in progress, towards equality and towards love.

Coexist without hate.

Rigoberta Bandini, in a concert at the Palau de la Música, on February 23.

Massimiliano Minocri

P.

Tell me some progress that you find difficult to digest.

R.

[Thinks about it for several seconds] I'm still going to say outrageous, but with this new technology and social networks we are in a universe in which I am conservative.

I am not clear that we have to move forward and move forward.

Let's put an anchor to remind us that we are human beings and establish measures.

For example, and I'm improvising: let's not let children have a mobile until they are 15 years old, that you have to enter social networks with facial recognition... It's just that now it's a jungle.

I think that when opening new land you have to be careful, because the trial/error system can do a lot of damage to some people.

P.

A rumor that exists about you: that you are from Opus Dei.

A.

[Laughs] I love that you ask me this question.

No, I'm not from Opus: I stick my boobs out at all the concerts!

I am very religious in my own way.

For me, God and faith have a lot to do with expansion, with not having limits.

And not the other way around: censorship, punishment and corset.

I claim the figure of God from the left.

It makes me very angry that the right wing has appropriated it.

Because God is love and equality.

Q.

And the Church?

A.

The truth is that I like Pope Francis very much.

I follow him on Twitter.

But the Church is an entity that does not represent me.

Comment on the controversy that was generated with the video of

women who participated showing their breasts spoke of censorship because in the end those images did not come out.

These feminists denounced that the decision had been made by a man, the director of the video.

She intervenes: “Many things were cut, including a natural childbirth of a friend.

It was due to an artistic decision because everything did not fit.

It was my decision and the director's.

I feel very bad that some women have felt violated and I apologize publicly, because I already asked in person.

But I don't feel like I did anything non-feminist.

Artistically those images didn't work, they didn't fit with the atmosphere of the video”.

She continues to reflect on this topic: “I approach feminism as a constant learning.

Damn, we should get that tattooed.

We have to stop judging each other.

I consider myself a feminist and sometimes a macho comment escapes me.

In the end we are taking off a skin, we cannot demand of ourselves to be perfect.

Let's stop this witch hunt.

We are in the same boat."

Cover of Rigoberta Bandini's first album, 'La emperatriz', released on October 7.

She talks about music again, that Joaquín Sabina had a fever in his adolescence, because she was “fascinated with the images he created”.

“But I stopped connecting, which hasn't happened to me with Serrat, I still listen to him a lot”.

She starts to sing a song by Maluma,

to which she was "hooked".

She thinks about the controversy of the new song by the Catalan Alizzz,

where the charnego of the periphery is vindicated against the Catalan cultural elites.

Lluís Llach replied: “You will create Catalan culture when you use the Catalan language”.

Bandini: “I think Alizzz's is a very cool song.

I think there needs to be topics like this.

Alizzz was born in Catalonia and his art is Catalan, although he does it in Spanish.

It is that if not, it is as if they were expatriating you.

I feel super Catalan and I sing in Spanish.

I cannot say that I am only Spanish, because I also feel Catalan”.

Bandini is going to finish this year's tour with his two biggest sellouts as a solo artist (outside of festivals): October 14 at the WiZink Center in Madrid and November 24 at the Palau Sant Jordi, both with some 11,000 people (also acts in other cities), and in 2023 it will be erased from the stages.

“I feel like putting myself on the frequency of creation.

Dive into my moves, see what comes out.

No time limit.

The same in May I climb the walls and I need to do something.

I don't want to be a slave to my words either, but now the idea is to dedicate 2023 to creating from within”, she points out.

The interview is over, the recorder is turned off and the singer picks up the mobile like a flash.

The journalist asks something, but she only has concentration for the screen.

News from Nico, her son.

She reacts after a few seconds: "Excuse me, did you ask me something?"

Subscribe to continue reading

read without limits

Keep reading

I'm already a subscriber