Itoiz | |
---|---|
Origin | Mutriku/Ondarroa, Basque Autonomous Community, Spain |
Genres | Progressive rock, pop-rock |
Years active | 1978–1988 |
Past members | Juan Carlos Pérez Foisis (José Gárate) José A. Fernández Estanis Osinalde Joseba Erkiaga Germán Ors Jimmi Arrabit Jean-Marie Ecay Xabi Pery |
Itoiz was the name of a Basque music band from the coastal towns of Mutriku and Ondarroa, started off in 1978 and disbanded in 1988. Born in times of turmoil for the Basque Autonomous Community (Spain), Itoiz stems from a dancing music band (i.e. playing other groups' songs) called Indar Trabes (1974), which performed mainly in evening festivities of towns. Throughout their existence spanning ten years, Itoiz dealt with several styles ranging from folk to progressive rock to pop.
In 1978, the members of the band Indar Trabes elaborated an LP album due for release in the Durango Basque Book and Music Fair; it included songs composed largely by the frontman Juan Carlos Pérez. They decided to rebrand the group on the grounds that the previous name was associated to evening dancing performances. They chose Itoiz (not because of the famous valley of the same name in Navarre). [1]
Their first album featured intimate and whimsical lyrics, wrapped up in progressive rock music. During the next three years they went through various reshuffles in the line-up, and the music grew more complex and elaborated, but the symphonic sound remained until their third album Alkolea.
In 1983 they launched the successful album Musikaz blai, which gave up previous progressive and jazzy music patterns, switching to pop-rock along the lines of prevailing music trends. Juan Carlos Pérez explained, "We used a progressive rock rhythmic pattern to fashion songs, while [guitar player] Jean-Marie Ecay brought in a new one, the one we called 'Fleetwood Mac rhythm', a binary rhythmic pattern we didn't know before. He brought along the song concept too, of a three-minute duration and a chorus. Up to that point, we made small conceptual pieces, songs with a long development." [2]
The LP album Espaloian was released next in 1985 to critical and public acclaim, featuring such hits as "Clash eta Pistols", "Espaloian" and "Hegal egiten". Unexpectedly for frontman Pérez, this more natural album earned them numerous concerts and record turnouts. Despite the band's relatively high popularity, they came in for bitter criticism and had to put up with hostile attitudes on the part of other bands on the rise in the Basque Country in the middle 80s as well as their public.
These bands stood for the punk and rebellious music movement gaining momentum at the time (Kortatu, Hertzainak, etc.) with which they often had to share the bill. "For the bands of the RRV [Basque rebellious rock], we represented the establishment's demands, commercialism, we were politically correct. The situation was really difficult. We had to face up to the people's attacks." [3] Another LP followed, Ambulance (1987), [4] but by that year Jean-Marie Ecay had quit the group (1984) and went onto another bigger Spanish band.
Juan Carlos Pérez was alone in charge of the whole artistic production and friction among members of the band started to mount. As Pérez was tired of the situation within the band, he finally decided to break it up with a last live album, Eremuko dunen atzetik dabil (1988)
The original line-up inherited from the band Indar Trabes went through various changes, and parentheses took place too (e. g., when prior to the release of Ezekiel, some members joined the band and some others quit). Accordingly, the band's music expertise and exigence in performance improved gradually. Some members worth highlighting:
Progressive rock is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Initially termed "progressive pop", the style was an outgrowth of psychedelic bands who abandoned standard pop traditions in favour of instrumentation and compositional techniques more frequently associated with jazz, folk, or classical music. Additional elements contributed to its "progressive" label: lyrics were more poetic, technology was harnessed for new sounds, music approached the condition of "art", and the studio, rather than the stage, became the focus of musical activity, which often involved creating music for listening rather than dancing.
In Spain, music has a long history. It has played an important role in the development of Western music, and has greatly influenced Latin American music. Spanish music is often associated with traditional styles such as flamenco and classical guitar. While these forms of music are common, there are many different traditional musical and dance styles across the regions. For example, music from the north-west regions is heavily reliant on bagpipes, the jota is widespread in the centre and north of the country, and flamenco originated in the south. Spanish music played a notable part in the early developments of western classical music, from the 15th through the early 17th century. The breadth of musical innovation can be seen in composers like Tomás Luis de Victoria, styles like the zarzuela of Spanish opera, the ballet of Manuel de Falla, and the classical guitar music of Francisco Tárrega. Nowadays commercial pop music dominates.
Los Lobos are an American rock band from East Los Angeles, California. Their music is influenced by rock and roll, Tex-Mex, country, zydeco, folk, R&B, blues, brown-eyed soul, and traditional music such as cumbia, boleros and norteños. The band rose to international stardom in 1987, when their version of Ritchie Valens' "La Bamba" peaked at the top of the Billboard Hot 100, and also topped the charts in the United Kingdom, and several other countries. Songs by Los Lobos have been recorded by Elvis Costello, Waylon Jennings, Frankie Yankovic, and Robert Plant. In 2015, they were nominated for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 2018, they were inducted into the Austin City Limits Hall of Fame. They are also known for performing the theme song for Handy Manny.
Jazz fusion is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, amplifiers, and keyboards that were popular in rock and roll started to be used by jazz musicians, particularly those who had grown up listening to rock and roll.
Thrice is an American rock band from Irvine, California, formed in 1998. The group was founded by guitarist/vocalist Dustin Kensrue and lead guitarist Teppei Teranishi while they were in high school.
Kortatu was a Basque ska punk band from the Basque Autonomous Community formed in Irun in the summer of 1984.
Caifanes is a rock band from Mexico City. Formed in 1987, the group achieved international fame during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The original line-up was Saúl Hernández, Sabo Romo, Alfonso André (drums) and Diego Herrera. Alejandro Marcovich later joined as lead guitar player. Caifanes' style can be described as a hybrid of British new wave, progressive rock and Latin percussion underscored by deep, somber and Latin American-Mexican Spanish-influenced lyrics and the vocal style of Saúl Hernández. Members of Caifanes have cited The Cure, The Beatles and King Crimson as major influences. Adrian Belew having produced their third studio album, El Silencio, as well as making a guest appearance on it.
Eskorbuto was a Spanish punk rock band from Santurtzi, Greater Bilbao, Basque Autonomous Community, that formed in 1980. They have been one of the most influential bands for Spanish and Latin American punk rock. They are known for their strong attitude and crude lyrics. They were one of the first bands to perform punk with lyrics in Spanish. Eskorbuto is a modified word taken from escorbuto . Along with the band La Polla Records, Eskorbuto has been very influential in the Spanish rock and punk scene.
Porter is a Mexican indie rock band based in Guadalajara, Mexico.
Cicatriz was a punk rock band from the Basque Autonomous Community (Spain) formed in 1983. The band had a big significance for the Basque Radical Rock. The band reached a huge degree of influence in Spanish punk, alongside other bands like La Polla Records, Kortatu and Eskorbuto, which rose to fame in the 80's underground scene.
In Buenos Aires, Argentina, a couple of lovers of dark and psychedelic rock and punk came together in 1998 to form Capsula, a band with a unique sound that blended garage, glam, and punk rock. Their name, which means "capsule" in Spanish, is derived from the David Bowie song "Space Oddity".
Soziedad Alkoholika, commonly abbreviated to S.A., is a crossover thrash band from the Basque Country in Spain. They were founded in Vitoria-Gasteiz in 1988. Their lyrics tend to have a crude, direct and somewhat emotional approach to politics and, among others, deal with issues such as: militarism, fascism, racism, sexism, state violence and monarchy.
Although the first instances of coherent Basque phrases and sentences go as far back as the San Millán glosses of around 950, the large-scale damage done by periods of great instability and warfare, such as the clan wars of the Middle Ages, the Carlist Wars and the Spanish Civil War, led to the scarcity of written material predating the 16th century.
Basque Radical Rock, was a musical genre born in the Southern Basque Country at the beginning of the 1980s and, although there was no specific event, it is considered to have ended in the last years of the decade. Basque Radical Rock bands were particularly influenced by punk bands like Sex Pistols and The Clash. It was considered an underground movement, born in opposition to the values proclaimed by Francisco Franco and spread by thousands of people who felt with the Spanish transition to democracy their Basque national and social aspirations were betrayed.
Más Allá del Bien y el Mal (2005) is the twenty-fourth studio album by Mexican rock and blues band El Tri. This is the first album with the recording company Fonovisa after parting ways with WEA. AllMusic gave it a positive review.
Joxe Azurmendi Otaegi is a Basque writer, philosopher, essayist and poet. He has published numerous articles and books on ethics, politics, the philosophy of language, technique, Basque literature and philosophy in general.
"Perfect Stranger" is a song by the American rock band Cheap Trick, which was released in 2006 as the lead single from their fifteenth studio album Rockford. It was written by Linda Perry, Robin Zander, Rick Nielsen, Tom Petersson and Bun E. Carlos, and produced by Perry.
Xabier Lete Bergaretxe was a Basque writer, poet, singer and politician. He started to write from an early age and he often published articles in the magazine "Zeruko Argia". In 1965 he created a band of Basque Music with Mikel Laboa, Benito Lertxundi, Joxean Artze, Jose Angel Irigarai and Lourdes Iriondo. The band, which was called "Ez Dok Amairu", disappeared in 1972, but Xabier Lete kept on singing with Lourdes Iriondo, who, by that time, had become his wife.
Joxantonio Ormazabal (1948–2010) was a Basque and Spanish author of primarily children's literature in the Basque language. He also published under the pen name of Joxean.
SALSWING! is the sixth studio album by the Panamian singer Rubén Blades and Roberto Delgado & Orquesta, released on April 16, 2021, through Rubén Blades Productions. It was produced by Roberto Delgado and features songs by Blades like "Paula C" as well as salsa songs and jazz standards such as "Pennies from Heaven" and "The Way You Look Tonight".