Chris Isaak does not remember when was the last time he performed in Spain, but he does remember what he ate: a calamari sandwich. From his hotel facing the sea in Monte Carlo, where he bathed this Tuesday morning, he tells by phone that it was his brother who recommended the food, and that he tried it in Barcelona, ??although perhaps the memory. Nor can he be blamed for having lived on the road for three decades, ever since the torrid Wicked game and its video clip with Helena Christensen put this rocker from Stockton, California on the map, who has maintained his references since he played in underground venues until today, when he will perform at the Alma Jardins Pedralbes in Barcelona.
His latest album, Everybody Knows It’s Christmas, is dedicated to Christmas
Some people have made Christmas albums, in fact I know other artists who made Christmas albums just because their record company wanted them to make one even though they weren’t interested. I love Christmas music, I already did Christmas songs [Christmas, 2005], but I have other songs. So when my manager asked me to do another album, I told him, “You can bet I’ll do it.” She told me that she write only one or two songs, and three weeks later she asked me “do you have two songs?” and I told him, “I’m 15.”
He doesn’t seem like the type of man who celebrates this holiday
You know, I spend my life traveling, but I am very, very close to my family, we have always been very close. My mother passed away during the pandemic, we are Catholic and my mother was Italian. It was a lot of, you know, cooking and getting everyone together at home for Christmas, so that means a lot to me.
Your last studio album is from 2015. Have you recorded new music?
I’ve written new songs, I finished the album last Christmas and then I went on tour, but when I finish it the next thing I’m going to do is record another studio album.
What will the next album be like?
I always try to choose the songs that are most interesting to me, I think it will be a pop and rock and roll album, that’s what I do. It’s funny because my music hasn’t changed, but the way they call it has changed. The original name was rock’n’roll or pop, and now people say it’s American. I go, “nah”, I think it’s just rock’n’roll because it’s not just America, everybody plays that.
Maybe it’s because young people don’t listen to rock anymore
Now I don’t even care what other people think, I’m at a point in my career where I feel comfortable and free because I don’t have to worry about being on the radio. I’m not even worried about that, I just want good music that I feel like singing to.
When does he compose?
I always have ideas, when I travel I write down the ideas. I carry a book and I draw every day, I make cartoons. I write down my ideas and when I come back from a trip I don’t have a luxurious studio in my house or anything. I take my guitar and sit on the stairs at home because it sounds better there. I sit on the stairs and play and sing and record.
Is your house in California?
I have a house in California and another in Nashville, where I practice with the band, they all come to have spaghetti for dinner, it’s like a group of firefighters living together in one house. But in California I’m right on the ocean, it’s a good place to get away and write. It’s full of guitars and records and books. I can’t stop myself, I try not to buy instruments, but if I see a keyboard or guitar I like, I buy it. And the same with pencils. I love to draw, and if I see a good pencil or pen I buy it. I started this tour with no pencils and now I look in front of me and I have 50 pencils on the table.
How long have you been drawing?
All my life, when my brother and I were kids, we couldn’t afford comics, but we made them up ourselves.
Is rock doomed to disappear?
I hope not, that it continues to be rock and that people listen to it. But I know that the music will continue and become new and wonderful things, the same way that rock came out of the music of the big bands. I loved big band music and then I loved rock and roll, and now I’m still waiting. The Beatles did something completely different after Elvis, who also did something completely different. And I’m still looking forward to the next one that’s completely different, that’s the fun part.
What will be next?
I don’t know, all I can do is try to write my songs to the best of my ability, that’s my contribution.
Have you noticed in the US that music in Spanish has grown a lot in recent years?
In California I grew up listening to a lot of music in Spanish, in all of California there are a lot of Spanish-speaking people. You have Spanish radio stations, Spanish television, so we listened to it, we exposed ourselves to it. Maybe not in Boston, maybe not so much in New York, but in California yes.
More than 30 years have passed since you published Wicked game, what is your relationship with this song?
I love it, I love singing it every night, it never got old for me, maybe because it was something I believed in when I wrote it: it wasn’t a trick, it wasn’t the fashion of that week, I guess it came from my heart so I It’s still fun to sing that song. I heard Wicked game before anyone because I wrote it, I remember writing it very fast. We had a rehearsal place, it was terrible, with a carpet on the dirt floor, it was under a building and you had to bend down to stand up. We were playing there and I said, “I wrote this song” and I played it, and the band said “it’s a little slow, but it’s interesting”. When we played it in bars, people would stop and listen, and they would never stop and listen! It wasn’t something they knew about but people would stop and listen to that song, so I knew from the beginning that I had something special on my hands.
