And Leonard Cohen played in Binéfar, Huesca

One of those anomalies that make our eighties a truly portentous decade: Leonard Cohen's performance on June 11, 1988 in Binéfar (Huesca), a town of 8,000 inhabitants.

Attention, it was not a singer-songwriter recital with a wooden guitar: Cohen, then at a peak of popularity thanks to

First We Take Manhattan

, performed with a full band, as he had just done in San Sebastián.

Concerts subsidized by city councils are now denigrated, primed projectiles launched against the so-called Culture of Transition;

Even the artists who benefited at the time hypocritically regret that private initiative was undermined.

In reality, we know little about the hiring mechanisms, the logistics, the sponsorships, the media involved, the sediment that those events (perhaps) left behind.

A detailed book is published about Binéfar,

The Year We Boycotted Leonard Cohen

(Milenio), by sociologist Josep Espluga Trenc.

The title already warns that that appearance created controversy.

Binéfar was governed in a minority by the PSOE with the support of the PAR, right-wing Aragonese supporters.

It was a PAR activist, Mari Carmen Pérez, councilor for Celebrations, who received the offer: Leonard Cohen had a free date on his Spanish tour and could perform in Binéfar for his current cash, 6,500,000 pesetas.

She had to decide at the moment and Mari Carmen accepted.

It turns out that Binéfar was a rock town: it even had a powerful band, Los Outlaws.

A prosperous town, too: together with Cohen, in 1988 Radio Futura and Siniestro Total were hired.

But the popular engine of the festivities was in the clubs, which on their own that year brought El Último de la Fila.

Among the groups, the Leonard Cohen thing fell fatally.

It seemed to them a concession to the past ("One of those soporific singer-songwriters") and an excessive expense that would lead to expensive tickets and - horror - the placement of chairs for a non-rock audience.

In the background, unspoken political tensions.

The promoters ran into problems.

On a national scale, when announcing Cohen's tour, Binéfar was sometimes ignored (in the program

Música Golfa

, on TVE-2, it was simply mentioned "a small town in Lérida (sic)." They were better received in the nearby capitals, with the support in Zaragoza of the very legendary Plácido Serrano. But, in Binéfar itself, they collided with the hostility of the local media. The outcome? Only 2,500 of the 5,000 available seats were filled. Among the public, "the living forces" dominated, older people dressed up for the occasion. The musicians maintained the boycott or heard it from the outside. It does not seem that Cohen was aware of the conflict: as a “song worker,” he put on a generous show, with two sets of encores.

At least, Josep Espluga Trenc discovers, he conquered an unexpected fan.

In the previous hours, José Nogués, a local truck driver, ran into the visitors in a cafeteria.

Although he knew nothing about Cohen, he approached him and invited him to Somontano wine and a plate of ham.

Nogués was more of Los Chichos, but he went to the

show

and became a fan.

25 years later, Espluga Trenc locates Nogués;

He is already retired, but he is still attached to Cohen and proud of having been awarded the Prince of Asturias: “If he came now, he would surely fill up.”

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