Justin Bieber

Ever heard of a blond girly kid with the incredible ability to amuse your little sister and her friends?

Yep. We all know it.

I've been reading and listening almost everywhere that he might be the most hated celebrity of all time. There are many Facebook groups dedicated to expressing hatred towards the kid, you can also find lots of websites questioning his sexuality and he is #1 in the top 10 Fail People list according to failblog.com. followed by Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi and Tiger Woods.

But why? I have asked a lot of people (even myself) in order to understand why so many people dislike the poor kid. 

There came a few theories about it.

1. Envy: Too simple to me. The fact that such an enormous culture of hatred is created around one specific person just because he's succesful or has any kind of talent tells me that there has to be something else there. I don't deny the fact that many people might be jelous, but I don't think that's the reason I'm looking for, considering there are many other succesful figures who don't get that kind of attention.

2. He's got no talent at all and he sucks: I disagree. He sings like a girl, yes. He dances like a ball-less rapper, yes. But he sings in tune, has a generous register and dances the way a ball-less rapper is supposed to. I think he's a good performer after all.

3. The music they write for him is horrible and his lyrics are empty: Again, too simple to me. It's all about your personal taste, and I don't see people hating every single artist they don't like. As I said, there has to be something else.

4. He compared himself to Kurt Cobain: That's a tough one. Might this one be? Well, as a matter of fact I don't even know if he actually said that, since I haven't found any primary sources. But it doesn't matter if he did or didn't. The rumor is enough for people to believe it.

Let's just assume for one moment that he did say it. That might be a valid reason for some of the depressive Nirvana proto-emo fundamentalists out there, but people already hated him before that. 

5. He dared to insult Hetfield, Mustaine and heavy metal in general: I must confess, at first he got me on this one, but I understand his case. He's just a kid and he's pissed because of this bullying campaign, and a lot of the people involved happen to be heavy metal fans. But that wouldn't explain why so many people who also dislike heavy metal hate him too.

6. Because he sucks dicks and is gay and stupid: I'm not even going to consider this one. But that's the one I usually get when I ask.

Well, first of all, I think life isn't always black and white, so there might usually be more than one simplified reason for things to happen. The first 5 theories I already presented might be involded in the whole case but I personally believe there could be one more to consider:

The Media in his deliberate crusade to manage the public's perception of him by creating this whole 'Bieber Fever' thing, caused a very negative reaction in all the people who didn't like him or his music because they were practically forced to hear from him, listen to his music and watch his videos. 

One day you find yourself watching TV and there he is, dancing and singing like a little nymph in love.

You might change the channel, but he'll be waiting for you in the next one. So you turn on the radio just to hear 'baby baby baby wooooh'. Then you say 'Ok, I'll just go out for a walk' and BAM! There he is again staring at you from that gigantic poster anouncing the movie about his life.

Oh my God! Run!

Then you go to the bookstore. 'I'll just buy something to read' you say. And there he is again with that evil look in his eyes mocking you:

Ha ha! you can run but you can't hide!

'A book about his life?! No way I'm buying it! I'll just read a magazine'. But when you go to the magazine shop you can't believe what you find.

You start to freak out. But that's ok... no big deal. It's not like you even read any of those magazines HOLY SHIT!!

Did you miss me honey?

And suddenly everything starts to look like a freaking conspiracy. On your way back home you see the love of your life, that girl next door you were so hardly trying to impress, and at some point of the conversation she says 'Have you seen Justin Bieber? He's like my perfect boyfriend!'

You slowly step back. Then you and run. You run like hell.

'They will never get me! No! get out of my head! waaahhh! Baby baby baby wooohh...' Suddenly he's in your head now. You know the lyrics, you know the steps, you know who he is and somehow you know everything going on in his life.

You pretty much are sick of him. Still you can't understand why and that's when you invent weird excuses to justify your 'hatred'.

Remember the Jonas Brothers? The exact same thing happened to them. But now that you can actually choose whether to listen to them or not, people seemed to be a little more respectful.

But in the end it's not Justin Bieber's fault that his producers pay the media for him to be everywhere. He just does what those evil businessmen tell him to do.

Right?

So let's try to leave the poor kid alone for a while. C'mon guys, you know he doesn't suck dicks!

Or does he?

Love songs

Lately I've been listening to the songs on the radio and a few thoughts came to my mind.

Basically this: what is it with you people and love songs? I mean, I like them myself but I don't see the point of having to make every single song a love song.

Don't you have any other thing to say at all? Really?! C'mon! Let's be a little creative here. You can write a song about anything. And I mean ANYTHING.

It doesn't have to be about a philosofical subjetc. You can write for example about the day you bought your first yoghurt or about those voices in your head who keep telling you to fart on the bus or whatever you think that can fit in your style.

Since it's starting to be more a never-failing commercial formula, I have started to wonder how many love songs are actually inspired on a real life person.

As I said, I like love songs. I even wrote one of those for a girlfriend a few years ago and I still like it. I like it not because the song says the most romantic things ever, I like it because it is sincere and reflexes how I felt about this particular person at that particular time and THAT is the magic about those songs.

The whole idea for me, is that every person you meet is different and therefore, every song is going to be unique (if you know how to personalize it of course). Every song is going to mean something, even if it is only a past memory, your present or just a desire.

But if everything you write is going to be about romantic love just because "it sounds good, it's normal,  everybody does it or because you have no other ideas", then the whole thing becomes empty and loses it's uniqueness.

It can still be a good song, though (commercially speaking).

But I'm not saying don't write generic boring love songs. What I'm saying is don't waste an oportunity to say something with an empty and meaningless message. Take your time, think what needs to be thought and let it be. And if you decide to write about tacos or Pac-man instead of the meaning of life or the torments of your past, that's ok, because fun is also a very good reason to write your lyrics.

I actually liked this album very much. The songs need more cowbell, though.

Decalogue of the perfect musician

This is actually something that Horacio Quiroga wrote under the title of  "Decalogue of the perfect storyteller". I just changed a few words to make fit into this particular kind of art. I think it's so good and precise that he should have named it "Decalogue of the perfect artist". Anyways, here it is:

I. Believe in a master - Hendrix, Beethoven, Blackmore, B.B. King - like in God himself.

II. Believe that your art is an unreachable goal. Don't dream about dominating it. When you become good enough, you'll get it without knowing it.

III. Avoid copying as much as you can unless the influence is too strong. The development of a personality requires patience.

IV. Have blind faith - not in your skills for triumph - but in your desire to reach it. Love your art like a girlfriend giving it all your heart.

V. Don't start writing without knowing from the first melody where you go. In a well written song the first 3 notes are almost as important as the last 3.

VI. If you want to express with precision the next chord progression: "Am - G - F", there is no better way to do it than that. Once you become the owner of your musical phrases, don't worry about cheking if they are supposed to sound good or not.

VII. Don't fill your compositions with senseless solos or melodies. It's useless to reload a weak note. If you find the precise one, it will have enough weight to stand on it's own. But you have to find it.

VIII. Don't beat around the bush. A simple song is not a symphony and a symphony is not a simple song. Keep this in mind as an absolute truth, even if it isn't.

IX. Don't write under the empire of emotion. Let it die and summon it later again. If you get to recreate it exactly as it was, you have walked half of the path to your art.

X. When you write a song, don't think about your friends or what others will think about it. (I added this part: Write your songs as if the only thing that mattered was your personal opinion. If you like it, others will too).

Speed, speed, speed

So you play a musical instrument huh? And you spend hours practicing trying to reach your goal. You realize that it's surprisingly hard and consider the idea of giving it up. In the end, for some reason you asume that the hardest things to play are necessarily the best examples of good music. That leads me to the next question:

What is music?

Well, honestly... I don't know. I can't tell you what music is. But can tell you how I understand the word.
To me, music consists (more or less) in combining sounds and silences with the purpose of creating an esthetical experience in any living organism with the capability of interpreting it as a logical structure with sense and meaning (such as melodies, rhythms, harmonies, or any kind of combination including any of those).

Feel free to share your own idea or definition with me. I'll be more than glad to read it.

To me, music has lots of avialable resources (as many as you get to imagine) for you to use (or not) that will help you in the creation of your little esthetical sound structure. I wanted to talk to you about one of those resources:

Speed.

As I said before, there's a lot of people who asume that the hardest things to play are necessarily the best examples of good music. Having said that music is probably too complex for an ordinary human being like me to define, I'll try to make my point using a simple analogy.

Picture a very intelligent and educated guy. He has a rich vocabulary and knows all kinds of complex and elaborated words. But he knows when to use them, because part of being smart is undertanding the context you're in so you know how to keep people following you.

A person who always uses complex and sophisticated words, no matter the context, is probably just someone trying to impress other people. Following this line of logic, a rich vocabulary is only one of the resources of your intelligence. To asume that someone is incredibly intelligent because he uses lots of weird words you don't understand, is as ridiculous as asuming that someone is a great musician because he can play fast.

Wow! You play so fast you must be the best musician ever!

In fact, playing slow could be even more challenging, because you are practically forced to create a melody in order to do something you or other people might want to hear again. But I'm not saying that speed is shit. I'm just saying don't get too excited about it.

Some examples of fast and good musical pieces (according to me):

- Far Beyond The Sun (Yngwie Malmsteen)
- Child In Time (Deep Purple, Made in Japan version)
- Capriche No. 24 (Niccolò Paganini)

Some examples of slow and good musical pieces (according to me):

- Europa (Carlos Santana)
- Moonlight Sonata (Ludwig van Beethoven)
- Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Pink Floyd)

I think you should keep that in mind before you start showing off on stage with a few senseless speed excercises... but must admit it can be fun sometimes :P

So tell me now, are you a machine or a human being? Are you a reproducer or a creator? Are you a player or a musician?

About being a hard rock musician in Peru

Well, as some of you probably already know, there is a country in a far far away godforsaken wasteland called Peru. A place where girls actually dislike guys with long hair. A magical place where the word rock is used to describe poorly manufactured pop bands with meaningless lyrics and pretty but untalented band members. A bizarre dimension where names like Ronnie James Dio, Ritchie Blackmore, Jimmy Page or Randy Rhoads are simply an enormous, gigantic and palpitating question mark. I'm talking about a country where most people actually believe that hearing a skinny mobster shouting all kinds of degrading sexist insults to women is music.
A wild jungle where people who dare to like rock and roll, jazz, heavy metal, blues or classical music are reduced to, basically, morlocks.

The thing is, my friends, I happen to live there. Why? Because if there is a god, he just hates me. He hates me with the strengh of a thousand suns.

So here I am. Now what?

Well, the very first thing I should keep in mind is this:

You'll never, EVER, make big money with your hard rock music in Peru you fat ass drunken retarded bastard!

Ok, then. So if no one gives a dime for my music, should I just quit? If the reason I play would be money, then my answer should obviously be "yes".

But that's not my case.

Don't get me wrong. I need money, just like everyone else does. I need to sell my records and I need to get paid for playing because otherwise I won't be able to afford a new record, new strings, a new cable, etc.

I guess the idea is not trying to pay your bills, your food, your house, your car, your horse or whatever with the money you make with your music and you'll probably be fine. Maybe the fact that there is almost no pressure for a hard rock peruvian musician to be commertial and keep his non-existent massive audience happy, could contribute to cause that a lot of them just do it for the music and the pleasure of being artists.

My point is, I hope you understand how hard it is for us to do this and I want you to know that everything we do, we do it from the heart. Thank you for your support and keep rocking. It's all about having fun, feeling satisfied with your work and learning a few things about ourselves.


But I still can't deny that Peru is certainly a land of opportunities.

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Could the ice cream man murder the president in YOUR country? I don't think so...