Paul Banks, Interpol’s vocalist and guitarist, was honest with his Mexican fans by confessing that the pandemic away from the stage felt like “living many lives ”
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Interpol has positioned itself as one of the favorite bands of the Mexican public, so it is common to see them in various cities of the country PHOTO: GRACIELA LÓPEZ /CUARTOSCURO.COM
“The call of rock and roll”, the cliché that some generations hear from our cousins, uncles or dads, even older brothers, is that little thorn in the brain, or the ear that just hearing a chord, humming a melody or following the rhythm with clapping makes us smile from ear to ear; in the most extreme cases, grab our backpacks and head to the concert of the band that gives us life, comfort, hope or inspiration.
From the darkness that shrouds the stage, the even darker -in personality- members of Interpol, as always, neat in their suits, shirts and ties, they reunited with the survivors of the COVID-19 pandemic that distanced everyone, musicians or fans, from concerts in Mexico and the world.
It is not a small thing, the resistance was not only to the disease, they took us away from art in all its physical expressions, from contact with people beyond the four walls in our homes , and there are those who also lost their jobs, or worse still, their relatives, friends and acquaintances.Tragedies that today come to find consolation in the Palacio de los Deportes. Between insiders and outsiders who idolize, feel, interpret and enjoy New Yorkers.
I don’t know if Paul Banks, Daniel Kessler and Brad Truax have it in mind, if each minute they know that someone in the audience has found relief in the riffs of C’mere or the melancholy of All The Rage Back Home, and the emotion behind Evil. Because it seems that way in front of the parade of greatest hits for big fans.
“It’s been a long time since we were last here, and I feel like several lifetimes have passed” , Banks, guitarist and vocalist, was honest in a stumbled Spanish, but well trained since the first times they stepped on Mexican stages, back in the first decade of the two thousand.
Interpol is one of the bands with the greatest affinity with the Mexican public, which is why they frequently visit the República PHOTO: GRACIELA LÓPEZ /CUARTOSCURO.COM
But there is no better answer to the question than to do everything within your possibilities so that the evening goes off without a hitch, after confirm that their drummer felt ill hours before boarding the stage. Slowing down was not an option, the residents of the capital arrived early in the morning and put up resistance to the sun, heat and pollution in order to have them in front of them, to be able to touch only their bodies, their gazes. To the aid, a drummer emerging masterfully mastered the beat of the rhythms and although they were surprised not to see Sam Fogarino on his instrument like he had for 20 years, they enjoyed it just the same.
In his drumsticks, moreover, he had complete control of the visual scheme: five linear steps of led lights and lamps that moved according to the rhythmic basis Interpol ordered, perhaps fortuitously coordinated with our legs, hips, arms and hair. The light show was powered by a mosaic of flashes orchestrated by the steps of the Iron Dome when a slow melody appeared.
Musically they are millimetrically faithful to the record they play.Sober, concentrated, immovable, almost attached to their two square meters of stage, they make just a few modifications, new arrangements or play the strings freely. They also demonstrate dance impulses, but the virtuosity is inhibited by tapping of the hands They want, they need, they want, they hope that everything coming out of the local sound is perfect.
Interpol is one of the bands with the greatest affinity with the Mexican public, which is why they frequently visit the República PHOTO: GRACIELA LÓPEZ /CUARTOSCURO.COM
Their daring is rather the animal sound that they conceived from their album Turn on the Bright Lights and that they have matured throughout the years to Marauder, his most recent full-length material. Identifiable to kilometers. Which makes us accomplices of an irrepressible desire to surrender to the passions of New York rock.
The wounds, for now, found comfort, even joy, in a night of music inside a famous Iron Dome in the middle of Ciudad de Deportiva that after spitting on the stellar mantle, and the cold of a night that requires us to continue the party, closed its doors until the next time we need Interpol to heal thought.