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Drugs, fights, mayors' vetoes and the scorn of the Movida: the other story of Invisible Dance

2021-06-18T05:28:27.474Z


The first time Javier Ojeda sang with the group it was a disaster. The second convinced his colleagues, with whom he maintains a 40-year career. He wanted to quit, but he's addicted to the stage. The documentary 'On this side of the road' now reviews the history of the mythical band from Malaga


With almost 2,000 concerts behind him, few know that Javier Ojeda dreamed of being a cultural journalist. And much less, that he failed his first test to be part of Invisible Dance. In 1982, Ricardo Texidó, founder of the mythical group, heard him sing drunk at the Disney Club in Torremolinos (Málaga). He was looking for

front man

[leader for the band], they were united by a great friendship and invited him to sing in the group. "Come on, you do very well," he said. "He insisted so much that I could not refuse," recalls Ojeda.

The thing went wrong. "It was a disaster," says guitarist Antonio Luis Gil. The nerves played a trick on that 17-year-old boy who days later repeated his attempt. It worked. Ojeda was the last to join a band linked to the musical history of Spain, the icing on the cake for a unique group. Four decades later, they are still standing. In 2019 they gave fifty concerts and this year they already have a dozen ahead. José Antonio Hergueta, director with Regina Álvarez of the documentary

On this side of the road

, which addresses the origin, explosion and trajectory of Danza Invisible, states: “They have not stayed on the road because of drugs, as happened to many, nor have they thrown in the towel. It is worthy of admiration ”. Ojeda assures that he has liked the work: “It has a very elegant invoice, although it may be too masculine and serious. Remember that we are the band that sings

El Club del Alcohol

, in reality we are infinitely more punk than what you can see there ”.

With just 57 years of age, the man from Malaga arrives at the patio of the Matiz restaurant, at the Molina Lario hotel, in his hometown.

Outside the heat tightens in the summer spring, there is not a soul in the street.

Inside the establishment there is an oasis with only three tables occupied.

Ojeda stops before the first two because he recognizes faces in them.

Greet with effusion, celebrate that he has already been vaccinated.

At the third table, he sees a coffee and makes a gesture.

Ask for a beer.

Invisible dance, in a concert in the Plaza Mayor of Salamanca Invisible Dance Archive

"Interviews are done with beer," he says in a forceful and recognizable tone of voice that echoes from all four walls. It is one of its singularities, like the kilometers it travels every time it gets on stage. Even seated, he gestures with intensity during the talk, not stopping for a second. As his friend Héctor Márquez says, he moves “as if his breakfast cereals had been exchanged for amphetamines”. After a couple of refreshing sips, take a breath and quickly go into flour: “When I entered Danza Invisible I was looking to make good music, play and have a good time. But what we wanted most of all in the group was to get drunk, fuck and get high ”.

Raised in the La Paz neighborhood, as a teenager he got on the Portillo bus every weekend to travel from Malaga to Torremolinos. It is a journey of only a handful of kilometers, but in the late seventies it seemed like a trip to the future. There was an island of freedom born between the fifties and sixties despite the Franco regime. It was his paradise, although years later the mayor Pedro Fernández, of the PP, vetoed the gang during his 12 years as mayor. Ojeda explains: “I publicly supported the ecologists of Los Verdes and it did not seem good to him. He was a chief ”.

Before that "dark stage" of the municipality,

punks

,

mods

and any urban tribe went unnoticed on its streets.

Torremolinos was in the eighties the most modern town in Spain.

And in the basements of one of its many bars, El Capote, Danza Invisible was born.

They were kids who did not waste a party, but within those four walls they exercised with discipline.

“If I skipped a rehearsal, Ricardo would call my mother to tell her,” Ojeda says in the film, presented on June 7 at the Albéniz Cinema and which will be seen during the next season on Spanish Television.

Poster of the documentary 'On this side of the road', directed by José Antonio Hergueta and Regina Álvarez. Invisible Dance Archive

The members of Danza invisible, during the filming of the documentary 'On this side of the road'.

Invisible Dance Archive

The direct of those young people attracted a lot of attention.

After winning a contest in Jerez, they went from performing at places like Hardy's in Torremolinos in exchange for a couple of cases of beers to filling venues in Madrid.

They arrived irreverent and with such self-assurance that the Madrid Movida did not accept them too well.

On the other hand, they were sponsored by their compadres from Radio Futura, with whom they performed on various occasions.

After one of those concerts, in Fuengirola, Javier Ojeda ended up sleeping in the jail at the police station after the police took him away and arrested him during a party in a flat.

“You get into a

rock and roll band

,

you're a kid and all of a sudden you flirt, take speed, do drugs (no joints, they make me feel awful) and we had a great time. Although deep down everything was healthier than it seems ”, says today who celebrates the Movida years, when the bars closed over and over again. He points out, yes, that not only happened in Madrid. “It happened in many places, like in Malaga, where perhaps we were more innocent. I think it was a healthy generational movement, less in the capital, where the horse killed a lot of people, ”says Ojeda, who remembers eternal nights in Malaga bars such as Casablanca or SA Company, in the Pedregalejo area, near the sea. .

They premiered with the album

Inner Contact

, which did not reflect that power they developed live.

Their second album,

Marathon

, established them on the scene, but the Ariola record company gave them the letter of freedom.

The third,

Contraband Music,

recorded in Manchester early mornings spiced with speed and days sleeping in a squatter house, catapulted them.

After

Direct,

the next work,

A tu reachable

made them go down in history definitively.

It includes songs that today are classics like the one that gives the documentary its name, but stands out above all

Sabor de amor

, a karaoke song par excellence and that few people in Spain have not heard - or sung, shouted, danced - ever.

Javier Ojeda during the filming of 'On this side of the road' Invisible Dance Archive

That year, 1989, the Invisible Dance craze was unleashed.

They devastated.

“It was amazing, but I didn't have a good time.

First, I had a girlfriend and what I wanted was to stop traveling and come back to see her.

Second, and, above all, I stopped being able to lead a normal life.

I continued living in my house, in the neighborhood, and I couldn't even go down to buy bread, ”says Ojeda when he was interrupted by a call from the mechanic.

It alerts you that you are late in repairing your old motorcycle.

Pick up the thread.

"I came to think of leaving it and focusing on what I was studying at the time, English Philology, because that's how you couldn't live," says the musician.

He did the opposite: he dropped out of college and continued with the band.

They played before 40,000 people at the Vicente Calderón, traveled to Mexico on several occasions (the first time a bag of marijuana was waiting for them on the hotel bed), they went to Poland, Switzerland, Holland, Morocco or Jordan. They have toured the Spanish geography on hundreds of occasions: today the group has almost 1,300 concerts. Guitarist Manolo Rubio updates a list in Dropbox with the vast majority of them. From the first one for which they charged "a few pesetas" in a nightclub in the Malaga town of Pizarra to those ahead of them this summer. The closest one, on June 27 in Las Rozas (Madrid).

In between, thousands of kilometers and the prize for a street in Torremolinos - as Ojeda told a young Mikel López Iturriaga in 1994 -. “At first we laughed, we had a street, like La Pantoja. It seemed like a hick to us, but today I love it ”, says the singer, who believes that at this point“ the van is sometimes tiring, yes ”. "Not now, after the confinements, we really want to," he says.

In that vehicle, the drummer Ricardo Texidó has been missing since 1993. It represents the most dramatic moment of the group, when the coexistence began to cloud, partly due to the rights of the songs. Texidó began to live alone while the other four members went to one. The situation reached its extreme during a concert in the north - they don't remember whether Logroño or Vitoria - and on the way back they decided that it was time to kick him out of the band. Manolo Rubio recalls: "It was like dropping a bomb in a van." Antonio Luis Gil underlines: "It was very strong, it was throwing out who had put us in the group." In the documentary, the moment is elegantly treated with all the members of the group, including Texidó. Ojeda affirms: “If we had wanted to take out the dirty laundry… but why? 30 years have passed since that.I still have affection for him for being my partner and even if we do not have much treatment, there is no resentment ”.

Invisible Dance, during the 1980s Invisible Dance Archive

The earthquake passed and the group returned to the road with joy. José Antonio Hergueta points out: “It's a band that didn't worry about being in Madrid or about being in the front row. They lived in Malaga and perhaps because of that singularity they are still there. They have never given importance and they do not have that aura of rockers from other groups, but it is that they have valued more being at ease, continuing to play and enjoying themselves ”. Today the band gives itself the same in a football field to burst as in a fair in the neighborhood of El Palo. And he is capable of making young or 40-year-olds and retired ladies dance in a popular dance. All this despite the fact that since the late nineties, the name of Invisible Dance was slowly fading. It has never been forgotten, but they have moved on to what their leader defines as "a wonderful second division."

Especially for him, who has a life in which he continues to be recognized --more in Malaga, where he is an institution - and he continues to receive the affection of the people. "Now is when you enjoy much more," he acknowledges. "Imagine being Pablo Alborán, not being able to go out, what a pain in the ass," he underlines. He talks about the Malaga musician and recognizes that there are many artists from his land that he follows. He names the electronic music of Bromo (a project by Paloma Peñarrubia), also the

indie

of La Trinidad or the flamenco of cantaora Genara Cortés. He does not forget María Peláe, "an artist", or Zenet and El Kanka. “I presume to be his friend,” says Ojeda, who knows a lot about this because, in addition, he is the author of the book

A History of Malaga Pop

(1960-2009)

, published in 2010. For years, he also wrote with football humor in the newspaper

Málaga Hoy

.

The singer is addicted to the stage.

"Feeling that people look at you, shout your name, is like when you ride a comfortable bike and enjoy pedaling through a beautiful place."

Isn't that called ego?

“Who doesn't appreciate being applauded?

Ego you always have, another thing is to be egocentric, selfish or directly asshole.

It is different ”, sentence.

In the first five months of the year it has offered five concerts, but the arrival of good weather and the decrease in sanitary restrictions underpin a busy second semester.

Until the end of the year he already has about 40 bowling on the agenda.

The members of Invisible Dance in 1983. Invisible Dance Archive

"I am lucky that I can adapt to many formats," explains Ojeda as he goes over the dates on the agenda and describes all the projects that he is up to. These days he rehearses the repertoire of his acoustic concerts, prepares those of Invisible Dance, studies that of a series of concerts about wine in Ourense and works on those of his current band, with whom he presents a new album,

Decantando

, on July 9 at the castle of Fuengirola. Recorded between Granada and Malaga, "it is a work of alcoholic celebration, partying," he acknowledges. On June 20 it is time to shoot a video clip.

In between, he is dedicated to the organization and management of the Funky Town festival in Torremolinos, plans a musical program for Canal Sur and has attended the premiere of the documentary about his musical career.

A hyperactivity that has him ground.

“Yesterday it gave me a slump in both sleep and vitality.

This month I can't cope, ”he confesses before disappearing into a meeting about a project that he can't reveal.

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Source: elparis

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