After registering a galley and traveling the world playing at being pirates, El Pony Pisador has spread its wings to embark on OCELLS (Guspira records), the fifth album by one of the most well-known and hilarious groups of Catalan folk, with which they aspire to take a leap in your career. To achieve this, they have not minded (well, a little) giving up a part of their DNA and adapting to the most popular tastes some themes with which they approach Catalan traditions for the first time, mixed with the sounds to which they are accustomed, and that embrace Celtic, Scottish, Balkan or bluegrass music, to which are now added the Mediterranean roots in the form of jota, polka, contradanza and, of course, sardana. All in an album that, according to its somewhat absurd coordinates, was born from a recurring joke because “words with two L’s make us Pony people laugh.”
“When we played abroad we performed songs with Anglo-Saxon roots, but none from here, and they asked us why,” reasons Ramon Anglada about the umpteenth musical mutation of the band, which had previously published two albums of sea shanties, traditional songs of the sailors, with notable international success. “In the Mediterranean area there is a whole sound that we like, but that we had never explored, and it is easier to make yourself known in other countries if you make songs from your land.”
As can be inferred from the title of songs such as Rafa ‘el Garrafa’, el gafarró del Garraf or La guerra de l’Emú, a true story with a surreal title, absurd humor has not abandoned the quintet formed by Adrià Vila (mandolin and bodhrán), Guillem Codern (banjo, harmonica and Tuvan singing), Miquel Pérez (fiddle, percussions), Martí Selga (recorder, whistle and double bass) and Ramon Anglada (guitar and accordion). It is the band’s hallmark, although, rather than searching for it, it was born from their musical interests, or disinterest when it comes to the lyrics. “The music we take most seriously is instrumental music, lyrics are only an obligation because people need to have lyrics and choruses, that’s why we have to make lyrics that say something, even if it’s ‘el meu pare is a format’ ( my father is a cheese) or whatever comes to mind.”
When you have the quintet in front of you and see them joking non-stop, it is easier to understand that they have composed most of their songs while walking, as happened with El llom del diplodocus, from the album Jaja salu2, lyrics born in New York on the way to the museum of natural history to see the bones of the extinct animal. However, in OCELLS, which they now present, they have put the brakes on humor to configure “serious” songs, such as L’espantaocells, Ala negra or Strelitzia (with the collaboration of Tarta Relena), while they have shortened the duration of the songs to adapt them to live. “This album is much more thought out than the previous ones, everything has a reason for it,” and that reason is called festival major. “If you are in Catalonia it is the only solution, the folk circle are small format concerts where the important part is the dancing.”
“We have had to make quite a few creative resignations because, if we play according to what things at a major party, people leave,” says Ramon. Hence the concept of stonk, which is alluded to at the end of the sardana Els animals més bells, a meme that refers to the search for economic benefits. “We picked it up to remember that we have to live off the group,” adds Adrià, “which is what led us to decide that if a song lasts seven minutes we should take away two or three, or eliminate repetitions when they are not essential.” The objective is to find a balance between the two audiences, folk lovers and those who seek fun at popular festivals without giving up their essence. “We want to bring folk to other circles, it’s great that a mandolin plays at Viña Rock,” says Miquel.