During the opening press conference, Javier Ajenjo asserted that he continues “fighting to make this a different festival.” Meanwhile, La Cabra Mecánica defied every kind of acoustic protection, bursting into the room above the words of the founder and director of Sonorama Ribera. If the Aranda de Duero festival has stayed strong for 29 years, it is because of this: music remains the most important thing.
That is how it felt during the concert of pablopablo, the biggest youth draw of the Wednesday lineup. At the edge of the floor, it seems this is not a festival-oriented show: music is a bit too quiet, giving way to whispers. To fully dive into the performance, you had to push further into the crowd, where everything quiets as Pablo Drexler’s voice begins to take center stage.
His live act is increasingly polished, incorporating ethereal quirks such as the outro of ‘Siempre te quiero a veces’, capable of lifting you out of your body, or performing recent tracks with tremendous flair. ‘Contigo’, in this sense, benefits tremendously. Those kinds of moments that make you revisit a song that perhaps didn’t fully convince you in its studio version.
This year, Sonorama is also a little more different thanks to the enormous size of its screens. Christopher Nolan would be proud. Thus, it’s hard not to appreciate even more the way Iván Ferreiro experiences his live performance, being able to fully notice every eyelid flutter or involuntary dance move. At the same time, the more mundane moments of his set, when the entire venue isn’t singing ‘Turnedo’ or ‘El pensamiento circular’, are also wonderfully enjoyed because it feels like watching a movie.
Elaborating on the Galician artist’s stage presentation, it leans toward technology, with his screen directly recalling Jenny Holzer’s installation work ‘Installación para Bilbao’, recognizable the moment you enter the Guggenheim’s doors. Among the lines of code you can read words like “BOSÉ”, “PINBALL”, “DORMILÓN” or “PIRATAS”. Fitting, since Ferreiro’s band was the total protagonist of the set, performing up to eight songs from his repertoire. ‘Años 80’ was enjoyed for obvious reasons, but ‘Te echaré de menos’ was the one that stirred the most emotion.
The performance by León Benavente wasn’t as emotionally charged, but it was no less overwhelming. In front of a purple backdrop, the silhouettes of the Spanish supergroup stood out against the backlight, proving they had reached the summit of elegance in indie. And perhaps also the height of courage. Like in their latest album, NUEVA SINFONÍA SOBRE EL CAOS, the night’s star was the mixing desk, occupying a central place on the stage.
Guitar hits like ‘Gloria’ or ‘Ser Brigada’ continued to echo immortally, always able to move the crowd to hum along to their iconic guitar line, but Abraham Boba’s band also dedicates a large portion of the set to their new electronic explorations. Their classics have aged like a fine Ribera del Duero, but ‘LA AVENTURA’ or ‘EN EL FESTÍN’ provide a brilliant counterpoint, inspiring the most existential dances possible. It’s hard not to feel completely drawn in by Boba’s stage presence, unless you get lost in his lyrics first, of course. This is a showman in ‘A LA MODA’, a percussionist in ‘Ayer Salí’, and a dancer as decadent as hypnotizing in… all the songs. The more years go by, the clearer it becomes that León Benavente will always be a hit.
During the rest of the opening night, Sonorama remained unmistakably different. It did so with the mass celebration of La Pegatina, capable of moving the crowds at will and of emptying the venue after their show, and with the throwback rock of The Molotovs, somewhere between Oasis and the early The Kinks.
