Blur revive in the Primavera Sound the years in which they were kings

2023-06-02T12:52:36.535Z

Highlights: The British group kept the type with its brit-pop and a Damon Albarn that despite not being the same as with Gorillaz knows how to maintain his scenic pose. New Order, charismatic as a marabú, made true that all past time was better. The only annoying thing was the noise pollution between their electronic beat and the main ones pumping. For example, the electronic beat of the two main ones is a pumping bass that prevents their main ones from exhaling their aromas.

The British group kept the type with its brit-pop and a Damon Albarn that despite not being the same as with Gorillaz knows how to maintain its scenic pose

Damon Albarn, singer of Blur, at Primavera Sound in Barcelona.Photo: Gianluca BattistaGianluca Battista

In a country that seems to flee from memory, festivals preserve it. Yours, that of your audience, that of music and that of the groups that fed your youth. On the first day of Primavera Sound, in its night tract, New Order before and later Blur put this Thursday that note of past times and it must be said that the walk of the calendar has not sat equally well to the two British formations. New Order, charismatic as a marabú, made true that all past time was better, while Blur kept the type with their brit-pop and a Damon Albarn who despite not being the same as with Gorillaz knows how to maintain his scenic pose. It is true that there is, has been and will be a certain air of, if not disdain, yes self-sufficiency of English drinking tea in colonial India, but if he was forgiven as a young man, how can he not do it by combing gray hair and with those black-rimmed glasses so intellectual that he wore? They were two of the many faces of a festival that, like all successful phenomena, moves between criticism and misunderstanding: if there are people it is uncomfortable, if there are no people it is a failure. Time to time, yesterday was the first day and except for the exception of last year has never been a crowded day.

Several people dance during the Black Country, New Road concert on the first day of Barcelona's Primavera Sound festival. Kike Rincón.Kike Rincón (Kike Rincon)

Let it be clear that the passage of time does not have to be a problem in music. Robert Smith at the helm of his Cure is an example. It is true that the hairstyle no longer suits him, but he continues to sing very well, believing what he sings and sounding like angels, dark, of course. On the contrary, Bernard Summer opted to sing like a rusty hinge, at least in the Primavera concert, tuning as such. His way of moving around the scene, some guitar plucks that only needed a tongue coming out of the mouth to accentuate the effort to make them and an air of undisguised routine weighed down the group's concert despite pulling successes. Among them, and as a clear example of their conceptual decline, a Love Will Tear Us Apart by Joy Division, the group from which they were born, whose somber song about divorce and the angularities of monogamy has long been exposed as a beodo anthem before running the heifers. Yes, they sounded good, which is the same as saying that a taxi driver with four decades of driving knows the highway code.

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So things Blur did not have it difficult and less with a Graham Coxson willing to lacerate his guitar. With a huge sign on the huge stage that said Blur, lest the public confuse them with others, the group also pulled classics -Coffee & TV, Parklife, Girls & Boys, Song 2, among others-, premiered two pieces of their imminent new album, a St Charles Square not particularly exciting and The Narcisist, And they greened those years in which they were kings. Or viceroys, that is to everyone's liking. His scenario, not particularly ingenious – nowadays everything is usually summed up in piling up lights and screens to the cry of "que no farte de ná" – had the distinctive point of offering his images diluted on the screens, an effect reminiscent of Dalí's own melted and hanging forms. The truth is that after Coldplay a laser is like a match if there is nothing else.

The English group New Order performs at the Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona. Kike Rincón.Kike Rincón (Kike Rincon)

Otherwise the night passed without surprises. The only comment is that the rain of the previous night formed small and sometimes invisible puddles in the artificial turf area of Mordor (sea platform), so that it was easy to feel like a marine dodging Vietcong traps while walking there. Nothing serious, the mistake wet the shoes a little and that's it. With the bars free of queues, the transit areas without crowds and the food stalls exhaling their aromas, this is an intolerable advertising that causes appetite even if you finish dinner, the only really annoying thing was the noise pollution between scenarios. For example, the electronic beat of the closest to the two main ones is a bass pumping that prevents their oblivion, and while Le Tigre spread their fun and ideological electroclash, with their lyrics on the screen so that it was very clear that they make party voluntarily descacharrada without losing the claim of gender and political criticism, the stage where Loyle Carner performed was leaked if you were not close to the stage of the American trio. Difficult ballot to reduce spaces without appearing some new inconvenience.

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The night left some other things to remember. For example, that Halsey's pop swim even seemed vitalistic after New Order —the American acted right after—; that the Nigerian Rema, whose concert started late, has a space in the festivals with his afropop with hip-hop emphasis, sung with a Barça shirt for greater empathy and that NxWorries, the collaboration between the satin vocalist Anderson. Paak and producer Knxwledge delivered a neo soul perfect for sophistication, cadentious hip movement and affordable luxury. Warm black music of a lifetime. Keep the party going.