Maximalist meeting: this is how Daniel Melingo chose to entitle his December 21st recital in Niceto.
A “unique and unrepeatable” show, where he will retrace his entire career: from glasses and kisses from Grandparents of Nothing and bliss in motion from Los Twist to this one tango oasis which was a central part of the Linear work which he presented in mid-September and early October at the Teatro 25 de Mayo, passing through its Spanish stage under the command of the lions in love.
And all this with invited friends: Andrés Calamaro, Hilda Lizarazu, Richard ColemanHugo Lobo (Dancing Mood), Maxi Prietto (Los Espíritus), Fernando Noy and someone else who is missing to give the final ok.
Recreation and appearance of Samalea
Sitting in his favorite bar in Villa Ortúzar, drinking sparkling water on a warm Buenos Aires evening, Daniel Melingo recounts the genesis of this concert.
“After the physical and mental exhaustion of the work, which required two years of preparation due to the pandemic, I wanted to take some kind of break before the end of the year. And it coincided with the fact that Gómez Casa, the drummer in my band, had to have surgery on his back, which was something he had been putting off,” he says.
“So… Oops! Sama appeared and everything shut me down”, he continues, introducing the figure of Fernando Samalea, who will take care of the drums in the group completed by Muhammad Habbibi Guerra on guitar and Ahmed Isa Ravioli on bass, respectively “my right hand and my left hand”.
“With Sama we played together in Las Ligas, the band that Charly (García) had in the mid-80s, and he was the promoter of the recording low tangos. He took over those tango songs I had, he got me the studio to record them, and he played bellows on that record. He is someone who has always been involved with me, directly and also laterally,” says Melingo.
Tracklist and tribute to Pepe Biondi
“The time Machine It’s an album that we hardly ever played live, because as soon as it came out I went to live in Spain, apart from the fact that it was well received by the public and received good reviews. And there Hilda joins first, with which we will do Seeing himand then Hilda and Maxi Prietto for the divine cry”, anticipates Melingo.
It is therefore possible to think of this Maximalist Encounter as a Greatest Hits by Melingo. So, the question arises: how to put together the list of topics?
“At first I thought of making several thematic blocks: one of low tangos, another of more rebétika music (a Greek genre), another more psychedelic… But it would have been endless! (laughs).
“The time Machine It’s an album that we hardly ever played live, because as soon as it came out I went to live in Spain, apart from the fact that it was well received by the public and received good reviews. And there Hilda joins first, with which we will do Seeing himand then Hilda and Maxi Prietto for the divine cry”, anticipates Melingo.
-Is it true that “Seeing him” was actually called “Seeing Biondi”, and that it was a tribute to the comedian Pepe Biondi?
Yes of course! We had to change the title and text, because we couldn’t use it Looking at Biondi, which was the name of the program. Then that semi-circulated letter remained, which speaks of the presence of that “light in the dark”.
“Maxi suggested I do it Guitar from low tangoswith Hugo Lobo we will bracelets by Leoni in love and with Andrés (Squid) to go. Richard will sing Are you a fish?, even by lions. And it all ends with Yesterday, where Sama will play the bellows, without drums. We have to have fun with this staff,” continues Daniel enthusiastically.
“It’s not something I do often. Fortunately I was able to match all of these artists and have the infrastructure to make it happen. It’s something commemorative celebrate friendship in an exaggerated way. The songs will respect the original versions, the exact structure, sung by their owners (laughs). And in rehearsal they sound superlative,” he points out.
2023, dedicated to cinema
The year 2023 will initially find a Melingo dedicated to its cinematic facet.
“We have just presented a film called at the Mar del Plata Film Festival Repair, which is Lucía van Gelderen’s first feature film. It is a film that was shot in the Península Valdés where I play with Flor Torrente and Luciano Cáceres“.
And continues: “I’m finishing the music for two films by Louis Ortegaand in February I’m going to Paris to make a French film on the subject the stage where Antoine de Saint-Exupéry lived in Argentina”.
“In the European summer, after a short stop in Buenos Aires, I will play with Típica Melingo, led by Maestro Juan Pablo Gallardo. It’s a large orchestra, all made up of French women, that has already played with me. There was a performance at the Banlieues Bleues Festival, which takes place every year in the Paris suburbs, which appeared on French television. And in the gaps that I will have between tours and films I will finish oasis 2of which I have advanced a few songs in the opera”.
But first, the self-described stringer will have “a year-end with a full orchestra.” “It was a pleasure I wanted to give myself: playing with all these great musicians. Y that everything is summed up in a meeting of friends. That’s what it’s all about.” The sun sets, the rain approaches, and the farewell is as warm as the talk. Pure heart and bones, like Daniel Melingo.
A Top Five from Melingo
in the bowling alleyThe twists, bliss in motion (1983)
The fourteen songs on Los Twist’s debut are proven and/or potential hits. in the bowling alley is the song that combines all the elements that brought them to the top: the surfer guitar of Pipo Cipolatti, the irresistible riff of the saxophone of Gonzo Palacios, the clarity of the base of Rolo Rossini and Cano, and the voices of Fabiana Cantilo and Melingo in a duet that mixes sensuality, puns and urban planning: “Flaca, for a while, all the boys are turning up their noses…”
chalamanThe grandparents of nothing, glasses and kisses (1983)
From the same year is the other album in which Melingo participated, essential for reviewing the Alfonsinist spring. chalamanbeside A thousand hours by Andrés Calamaro, narrate in code for initiates the complexities of traveling with prohibited substances in a country where the police edicts of the dictatorship had not yet been repealed.
braceletslions in love, Lions in love (1992)
The debut of Lions in Love, or what trip hop sounded like from Madrid before the Anglo-Saxon press popularized the label. The Belgian Stephanie Ringes (Melingo’s partner at the time), Pablo Guadalupe, Willy Crook and Guillermo Piccolini, among others, completed the formation of a group that was ahead of its time and still sounds contemporary today.
YesterdayDaniel Melingo, low tangos (1998)
“I’m leaving the neighborhood, I’m leaving the neighborhood, sad melody that I hear on my way out…”. Melingo’s reinvention of the tango, at the hands of this underground hit which, today, is a fan favorite of his. A 2 x 4 from the banks and a prisoner, owing both to Feo Edmundo Rivero’s goal and to Tom Waits’.
linyeraDaniel Melingo, linyera (2014)
Melingo’s penultimate alter ego is the figure of the linyera, which is the motif that is repeated on this record, in to go (2016) and in Oasis (2020). Live, in the middle of the song, the singer usually pitches lines by Uselessthe classic by Moris, and the combination of the two songs is perfect
WD extension
Source: Clarin
