Fito Páez: “We live in an era of homogenization and imperial dominance of the telephone.”

The term "incombustible" suits Rodolfo Fito Páez well, a loquacious verb who, at 62 years old and with 28 albums under his belt, displays a frank smile on the other side of the screen. Sitting in his home studio, a room with parquet flooring and a fireplace, behind him can be seen a drum kit and several guitars that reflect the Rosario native's commitment to music. "I spend hours here," says the artist, who this year presented Novela, a rock opera featuring witches, circuses, and lovers that draws directly from the Beatles—even their Sgt. Pepper's —the Who, and Queen. An ambitious work, his musical legacy, which he began writing in the 1980s and completed four decades later, ready to be presented this July in our country with visits to the Palau Sant Jordi in Barcelona (July 5) and the Movistar Arena in Madrid (July 8). He is awaiting a theatrical version that is currently in the works in the capital.

You're accumulating many musical anniversaries, it's inevitable. Are you worried about the passage of time?

The passing of time seems wonderful to me, because if it doesn't, you're dead (laughs). It's a very good sign, even though your body is shutting down. You have to take a little more care of yourself in all the things you enjoy, and there's also something about the joy of the passage of time.

There are beautiful things.

You see everything from a more relaxed perspective, and at some point, the passion disappears. Passion gets very good press, but it brings headaches and general problems, issues. So it's not that it disappears, because now I can sit down to write, and that's why eight hours go by and I'm there, I'm still there. But the passion is tempered rather than disappeared, and the problems aren't so many anymore, they're different. The health of your children, your health, the conflicts become more focused.

What doesn't fail is the pace of composition, with 28 albums already under his belt.

I spend the day here inside. Obviously, I have some social outings, although they're becoming fewer and fewer. But I don't write songs or music for albums. You're studying, experimenting, playing, singing, recording, writing, and at some point, something comes together.

Quadrophenia I repeated the format: introductory text, photo intervention and the two discs with the lyrics.

This was not the case with Novela .

Novela was a very special case because it needed the framework of the story, the script. First, I constructed the plot. In the years 1988 or 1990, I composed a large part of the material, from which eight songs will have survived, and now I've composed another 17. But I needed the framework, I needed the time, and, being a work of this magnitude, I needed a laboratory, a testing ground, which is the most beautiful part of the composition and arrangement process, when a song takes 10 different forms in a week. Which one best suits the story, the overall timbre of the album? In that laboratory, decisions are made that help make it a more compact work.

What has allowed you to finally complete the work?

First, I had to finish the story, because I was composing it without having the complete framework; they were like vignettes that accompanied the script. I imagined the scenes filmed with that music little by little, and the script was finished five years ago, before the pandemic began, and then I needed to compose 17 songs. But ultimately, I find there's something of a legacy; this is my point of view of how I think things are. Hence the story of that small town next to Rosario, the idea of ​​the traveling circus, the academic environment, the story of romance, paganism versus academia, good versus evil, the human pack... many concepts that one has been developing about what human behavior is like. And there's delirium, which is part of rock culture, although not so much a Latin Americanist thing like magical realism, but rather contains more of the lysergia of rock. And of course, there are the Beatles: the direction is very clear.

It also sounds like Queen, and the classic character of Jimmy appears, a tribute to the Who.

I repeated the format of Qadrophenia , which includes the introductory text, an altered photograph, and the two discs with the lyrics. That was the idea, the inspiring format.

“Jimmy hates reggaeton, hollow rhythm, fake gold, counterfeit, Luis Vuitton.” Is that your opinion?

That's Jimmy (laughs), but you're all the characters. I think a young, wild, intelligent, cool, sensitive guy doesn't fit in with reggaeton.

You don't like reggaeton.

It's not part of my culture; there's no melody, I'm not interested; there's no harmony, I'm not interested. It's my idiosyncrasy, which gets bored with certain expressions. I'll elaborate a bit more on all this later in an essay that will be published at the end of the year, titled "Music in Times of Mass Dementia." Obviously, the world has changed, and I wouldn't focus on music, but rather on the cultural phenomenon the world is experiencing right now. It's a general impoverishment; we're in an era of homogenization and imperial dominance of the telephone. I get the feeling that everything is messed up: the media, political life, the technological revolution... There are so many things that kids today have to deal with, and no one is prepared for that because it's exactly a hurricane.

Perreo and feminism Perreo and feminism

Is this reflected in Milei's Argentina?

The world has become brutalized, it has shifted to the right, it has become absolutely individualistic, all the empires of the socialist left have fallen, Marx's ideas didn't work in reality, nor did Gramsci's in politics. It is in this context that what is happening in Argentina is happening, and Milei would fit within the logic of the times; it could be him or it could be someone else, the name doesn't matter. He has to fulfill a specific function, which is what he is doing within this new scenario, this pathetic scenario.

The other day there was some commotion over some statements in which I didn't reflect well on perreo.

The new feminism sometimes seems pristine; there's nothing you can do about it; you're committing heresy if you start debating something. I don't agree with that because I believe I've been a feminist since the day I was born. I feel empowered to debate certain things. And besides, I'm an artist, so I'm also familiar with these matters. When someone injects misogyny and treats you like shit into a musical genre, I think we need to invite reflection. There are women who defend one thing and then go off and dance to another, and I ask them, "Are you dancing to something where you're being treated badly?" At least explain it to me; I need an explanation. But no one came forward to explain. I need an argument because I have nothing to do with misogynistic culture; it doesn't represent me, nor do I empathize with it, and "I'm part of the trap tribe" isn't enough for me. Explain it to me, tell me.

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Returning to the album, it closes the story with love. Has your conception of love changed over time?

I think it's the only subject that truly interests me. The first thing one thinks about love is a bit like what Novela is about, which is the first romance, the first time, when that pure feeling appears where you give everything for the other. Then the years go by, you live through many experiences as a couple, your children are born, and you realize that no, love is even greater, it has another, even higher dimension. I think Christ lavished that love in the sense of piety, of giving without expecting anything in return. It is in that self-sacrifice that love becomes immense, has an immeasurable value, and is only about companionship in the short span of life, in which we are all lost pretending not to. If it causes harm, it is not love.

Are you going to perform Novela during the concerts?

We're studying it, and I'm also preparing a theatrical production; we'll have to see if it's possible due to the costs. Matías Umpiérrez is working on it in Madrid. They've already presented me with a first draft, and it would be like going to see a concert, but you'll see the most important scenes as things happen in the hour and ten minutes that the album lasts.