Since that Courtship Manual, forged in 2019 with our Raül Refree, the Asturian Rodrigo Cuevas has not ceased to dazzle us with a proposal that infuses outstanding contemporaneity into the traditional heritage. On Friday, at the Porta Ferrada Festival, who defines himself as a “folk agitator” signed another night of aúpa with the show La pilgrimage, premiered in June in the (a)phònica cycle of Banyoles. Function that is nourished with the songs of the album Manual de pilgrimage, which will be put into circulation on September 22, although some of the singles have already been advanced.
It was about, he said, "celebrating things that we take for granted, like the freedom we have, and that we can enjoy because many people worked hard for it." Very suitable reminder in times of increasing carcunda like the current ones. Cuevas (voice, percussion) performed with Mapi Quintana (vocoder, bass, percussion), Juanjo Díaz (percussion, programming), Rita Ojanguren (guitars, percussion) and Tino Cuesta (programming, synths, percussion), performing the first number of the night, going down to the village, from the stalls. Triumphal entrance of the one who masters the noble cabaret arts, which gives a stimulating plus to the thing.
Supported by the most deeply rooted, Rodrigo Cuevas's speech merges and dialogues with electronics, becoming even more important thanks to the extraordinary vocal competence he displayed. There will be time, when the Pilgrimage Manual is available, to savor the details. But in the first live listening to the new songbook, we were already assaulted by a good number of targets, such as the raps from the opening section of Más animal or the exquisite Allá arribita, which perhaps can be read as a celebration of the landscape. The whimsical drawing of the electronics in Valse, and the games of voices of the otherwise very jungle Casares, marked new points of interest of a night in which some 750 gathered spectators danced and laughed heartily.
Among what happened in a little less than an hour and a half of appearance, it is impossible to ignore the virtues of Tell me, green bouquet, a beautiful song in which Rodrigo Cuevas recalled the bullying suffered during his childhood. Right away, he invited us to dance like crazy with Como yé?! , a piece that among other virtues showed a remarkable pop dot. Outside of the new agenda, and among others, he turned to Rambalín, a tribute to the drag queen Alberto Alonso Blanco, assassinated in Gijón in 1976. More anecdotal, although funny, were the two notes from El meu avi in a pasodoble/habanera key.
The day in Sant Feliu was complemented with the performance of Baiuca, the folktronica project of the Galician Alejandro Guillán, which had among more members the voices of Andrea and Alejandra Montero. Contagious and relentless dance session with songs like Meigallo or Luar on the program, and with the presence of Rodrigo Cuevas in the final phase, teaming up with them in Vaqueiras and the one already recorded with Baiuca Veleno.
