“Rock is not dying,” says guitarist Alfonso André of the Mexican band Caifanes, who reappears with a new song

For more than ten years, the rock seems to be in the background in the music industry. Certainly, it is not the genre that prevails at award ceremonies or festivals. But it is not dying. And that is a long way from happening. This is how the Mexican group is experiencing it Caifanes, one of the icons of the rock Latin American of the 90s.

“He’s not dying, he’s going through a bad timealthough that is nothing new. The rock he has always been in the drains (sewers) since he was born”, assures the percussionist Alfonso Andredrummer of the group, in a tone that can well reassure us during an exclusive interview with this newspaper via video call.

Moreover, the musician recalls: “We had to be in an even worse stage than what we are seeing now. When we start the rock it was practically forbidden in our country and we lived it in the sewers, we played in clandestine places. Fortunately, he happened to be in a very particular historical moment, in which everything changed overnight and became a boom the rock in Spanish”.

“Today unfortunately the support is elsewhere, in reggaeton, in urban music”, says Andre. “It is what is being heard and what is fashionable, but the big music festivals rock they still exist in Latin America, all over the world, and the public is still there”.

The thing is the rock still has many stories to tellwith its legendary riffs and his unmistakable solos that make the electric guitars sing without words. Therefore Caifanes has just released a new song. It is the simple It’s only youwhich wants to invite us to pause that life that we maintain in the virtual sphere and rather reconnect with what happens outside of it, real life.

“Try to turn around to see ourselves, to put aside all this contamination that there is from social networks and likes and of the followers, which is what is valued today. And that, well, is really nothing important. The important thing happens outside of cyberspace”, maintains the artist.

Difficult not to find in those words a resemblance to the success that consecrated them, Outside (1994), a hit that for many became a hymn about focusing on the inside, learning to feel complete with your inner universe. This new cry of “outside”, 30 years later, seems more liberating.

“We are very addicted and very involved with these gadgets, which are a very important tool, and that is, a tool, we must not forget that life passes on the other side,” says Alfonso.

creation and evolution

The new theme comes three years after Woundedthe first single they created as Caifanes, in 2019, after 25 years since his last record production. “It’s a little unfair to say that it was our only song in 25 years, because all this time we were like Jaguars and we released many albums during that stage”, clarifies the drummer, although he does admit that under the original name there was a kind of delay.

The group had split up in the mid-90s. and some members continued with the Jaguares project. Following a reconciliation with the original lineup, Caifanes revives in 2011. It is currently made up of André and his caifan colleagues for more than two decades: Diego Herrera and Saúl Hernández (vocals). accompany them Marco Rentería on bass and Rodrigo Baills on guitar and solo.

“We had the idea of ​​going back to the studio, but the relationship between us was a bit tense, with a lot of work, and it kind of got postponed. Then comes the pandemic that kept us out of circulation for a year and a half, with Caifanes in limbo, because we were in different cities, ”says the 59-year-old rocker. And, as a ‘mere’ old-fashioned band, the musicians did not conceive of making their art from a distance. “We needed to all be in the same room to create something new.”

In the first rehearsal in the studio they made combustion of three new songs that could be their next singles or maybe even a disk. At least there are a total of eight songs in the oven, according to what the musician says.

“The way music is consumed through platforms has changed a lot,” says André. “Now the music is there in the background (while you do other things) and for only 100 pesos ($5) a month you have access to all the music in the history of mankind. It’s very convenient for the user, but I think it detracts from the value of the music,” he laments. “When I was young I had to save to buy my favorite artist’s album, which took months to arrive in my city. And when I had it in my hands it was like a treasure, I opened it, smelled it and read all the credits, the lyrics of it. He would play the record over and over until it wore out.”

Now the relationship with music is obviously different, less physical. “You don’t listen to a complete album anymore, everyone prefers to hear playlist which suggests an algorithm. You have to adapt because music is a business”, illustrates the artist.

According to Alfonso, who also has a solo project under his name, which in fact he recorded live in 2020 as a tribute to David Bowie, the bad moment of rock that he mentions at the beginning of this article is also one of the most underpaid in the industry.

“In order to buy a coffee, you need to have millions of listeners a day (…) So we live from live concerts, we can’t stop touring,” explains the drummer. “Also now artists are releasing singles, they no longer ‘lock themselves up’ for months to record an entire album. Something that is not new either, it happened in the 40s, 50s (…) We are trying this new way, which has its good side”.

Tour in the United States and Mexico

“We make music because it is a pleasure and a necessity for us”, highlights the rocker. “We don’t do it for fame or anything else. Fortunately we were able to make a living from this, otherwise we would be driving a taxi. It is what we like the most and the only thing we really know how to do”.

Since February, Caifanes began to play on stages in Mexico, in March they landed in Colombia and they have planned presentations in the United States and their country of origin until June.

And that is one of the ways to support an artist in all its stages. “Sooner or later we are going to retire, if we don’t die on stage, we’re not young anymore”, jokes the musician. That is why he says: “You have to support new talent so that this movement can continue to grow.”

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