Interview with Mario Pacheco, director of Nuevos Medios

"The next generation of artists should be talented musicians with a solid base in flamenco; musicians that have grown up listening to Ramón Montoya and working with Benavent or Paco de Lucía"

Silvia Calado Olivo. Madrid, May 2002

Although the Spanish counterculture movement known as "la movida" was the focus of attention in the early 1980s, another movement was taking place in the world of flamenco. At that time, the art form was going through extremes: "Discredited or intellectually exalted." Mario Pacheco came into contact with flamenco through a general social environment, but also as a photographer shooting album covers. He explains that, by the early 1980s, "the flamenco-pop movement of the early 1970s had already come and gone, and we picked up on that movement. On one hand, there were all those productions of Ricardo Pachón and José Luis de Carlos with Las Grecas, Manzanita, and Lole y Manuel. And nobody had very kind words for any of that: neither the press nor the record companies. On the other hand, you had the Mairena-influenced productions, that were living their last days. There were still festivals and singers from that period of ideological flamenco; a liberal vision of flamenco that Caballero Bonald or Blas Vega had produced since the 1960s. Since the record companies hadn't fully explored one tendency, and people started to get a bit tired of the folklorists and liberals in the other tendency, there was an unexplored area between the two: the connection between flamenco and pop music". This was precisely the area that Nuevos Medios set out to explore and develop 20 years ago.

Mario Pacheco (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

Nuevos Medios was facing an unexplored market niche.

We tried to establish the connection between the world of pop music -where we weren't exactly leaders, creators or even well-known- and flamenco. There were people that had the right background for it, since they were real hippies, like Camarón or Morente or Paco de Lucía, but it didn't make sense to them. The first ones to take to the idea were Pepe Habichuela and Ricardo Pachón, and we immediately started to work with them. They'd always had problems with the bigger labels, and we were offering something different. When we started working with younger artists, like Pata Negra, Ketama and Riqueni, our visions and objectives coincided completely. At that point, everyone agreed on what should be done in flamenco, and there wasn't much to even discuss.

Not everyone understood what you were doing, did they?

No, especially the media. There weren't any problems with the public, even though we were doing some weird stuff back then. Ketama's first performances were with an English group doing the Manchester thing, and Pepe Habichuela played in a bullring in Marbella with New Order: completely unthinkable. That was when techno, indie and the Smiths were popular, so people accepted it, but the media didn't. And the musicians weren't crazy about it either. Nobody was prepared; not even we were. It was sort of a mystery for the musicians and the producers. No one was sure where to take things, and that was the beautiful part of it, because you ended up inventing things. The critics were always hounding us; even the most reasonable flamenco critics were really harsh. In Jerez, they were critical because the artists were from Madrid. Even Camarón got bad reviews back then.

How did the artists react to such a hostile reaction?

In the world of flamenco, I didn't think it was such a bad thing, because everyone was doing something different. Morente did some great things in that sense, and used the feedback to his advantage, although some critics were really hard on him, a lot harder than they were on Camarón. There were times when you could almost say that he was asking for it, because he did some really weird stuff onstage and in recordings. But it was a good thing for him. He liked seeing a critic get upset over what he was doing, or that they called him "retro," or said, "Marchena is the devil". And he defended what he was doing. Then, suddenly -I don't know when- everything changed, and it was all suddenly very easy. Everyone wanted to see them on television, and it all became too easy. Every recording was great; they're all geniuses no matter where they go... It's all been downhill for the last five years.

What are the reasons for the change?

Because people don't understand this, so they follow fads. First it's "no" and then it's "yes". There have always been two or three honorable exceptions of people who've got their own opinions, and everyone else does what's fashionable. Things come together, and it's suddenly cool to like something. The interest of municipal governments and the subsidies and all that was politically correct. It was like heritage and tradition, and, at the same time, it was exotic, world and fusion. All of that came together, and wham! We started to sell.

Mario Pacheco (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

What kind of relationship is there between the company and the artists?

It depends a lot on the kind of artist. For example, the first recordings of Ketama or Ray Heredia are all basically songs, so there are a lot of things to work out. A recording by Carles Benavent is different, because there's less to work out. He's got his music, and I normally enter the picture when I'm the producer. When I'm not the producer or co-producer, and someone else is doing the job, you specify when you want it done and whether or not you like what they've done. What also happens is that you like that person, you believe in him, and you know that he has your same limitations. So you decide to just take it easy, and let things develop with time. You can see that person's shortcomings, but you're not going to get in his face. So, there's a lot more dialogue and debate than in a normal record company, or, at least, things are more direct. Nobody has to make an appointment to talk to me; things are discussed quickly, and we pay attention to the product. We've almost never had to force an issue, because all of us are normally working towards the same goal and wanting to learn from each other.

When you were starting out, did you have a clearer idea of the artists you wanted to record?

At that time we recorded anyone we wanted to because nobody was recording and nobody was being recorded. Now it's a different story. No one's available because they're all under contract, or they're with a dance company and they're not interested in recording because they're making good money. It's harder now.

What kind of artists are you looking for?

Now that flamenco pop has already been invented, there aren't likely to be innovators like the generation of artists like Lole y Manuel, Camarón, Morente and Manzanita, or the generation of Ray Heredia, Ketama, Rafael Riqueni and Pata Negra. Now, there's a sound and a public. In flamenco pop, it's all a question of launching the artist, but the style and the sound have been invented. It's not like it used to be, when you just made up a kind of music as you went along. So, since that's already been created, and it comes down to spending money on launching the artist, we've decided to focus on the musical aspects of flamenco. We think that the next generation of artists should be very talented musicians, with a solid base in flamenco; musicians that have grown up listening to old recordings of Ramón Montoya and working with Benavent or Paco de Lucía. An example might be Diego Amador. We're also interested what the musicians are doing. A recording like Pepe Habichuela & The Bollywood Strings is an adventure. That's where we want to go: recording very musical artists like Pepe or Diego... Or even Diego Carrasco. His work doesn't really involve singing, because it's all based on rhythms, what he does with them, and his personal touch.

The budget is a determining factor…

We have to avoid products that are expensive to launch. Some kid might be a great singer, but if we have to spend eight million pesetas to launch him on a radio station, he'll have to go to someone else who's got that kind of money.

How do the artists feel about the recording studio?

Artists usually make more money performing than they do from recordings. Recordings are like a showcase of their work, and it gets them gigs. Fortunately, they're doing very well.

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