One day soon, I'm going to write about a band other than Manolito - I swear. In fact it could even be tomorrow (Pupy at Galiano, and maybe even Vannia, if I get my shit together). But it's not today.
I've just walked up a deserted Neptuno - which is a little disconcerting alone, and at this hour (2am); especially for the last two blocks which have no streetlights at all - after seeing Trabuco at Galiano. Fantastic. Again.
The great news is that they started with La Raspadura and followed it with Hablando en Serio - which, I hope, is now part of the set. I'm wondering if the new residency at Cantante - which they're calling a "peña" - is kind of a rehearsal; or at least a dry run for their other gigs. Whatever, I'm the happy recipient of their toil, so bring it on, I say.
There were very few Cubans there tonight - which was weird. What was funny though, was when a huge group of tourists started doing a rueda during Sacude la Mata; and Mayami started yelling out calls: Dame! Dame otra! then I'm sure he just made something up. He said something like "setenta y nueve con sesenta y dos complicado!". I dunno: he probably didn't make that up - there's probably some school somewhere that does that. Funny though. I was actually the victim of a horrible dancer at that point. Que tragedia; as I love to drink in Mayami when he's in the spotlight. Or any time, quite frankly. And this guy was being a total wanker: you know, leaving me with absolutely nothing to do while he did all these fancy steps and kicks. AND I COULD HAVE BEEN WATCHING MAYAMI. I was craning my neck, on the few turns he did, so I could see him. He actually wandered throughout the room, singing, which was cool. Anyway, this guys says: do you know who you're dancing with? And I say no. And could have added, and actually I don't really care. But I just stopped dancing with him and directed my attention elsewhere (ie the band, who were actually deserving of it).
Some old dude got up and did some decima improv during El Indio's song Sabrosona, which made me feel a bit sorry for him, as he gets so little time in the spotlight these day, though they did a bit of Ya no hace falta again - would have been nice if they had done it all.
Amaray is singing this song at the moment - it's familiar, but I'm not sure what is. It might be Amar ... y, but I'm not sure. They opened with it at Miramar last week, and my first thought then was: wow, I hope he has really shitty foldback. He was out of tune for more or less the entire song. News just in: not shitty foldback. He didn't nail it tonight either. The times he isn't out of tune he's straining so hard to reach the notes it's painful. I don't know why he needs to do it: he has plenty of other good songs that suit him (not least of which is the previously mentioned and totally ace Habland en Serio). I had another really sad dance with another wanker who just dicked around, gave me no leads, then got pissed off when I wasn't where I "supposed" to be. His lead was a finger pointing to his side. Mate, I said, lead me there and I'll go there (but obviously in Spanish, ja ja). Much better off dancing on my own with the band. Which is what I prefer when the band is as smoking as this anyway.

Apart from the awesome music, what I love about this band is how much fun they have on stage: they're all smiling and doing little dances with each other - it's so cool. Tonight they seemed in especially fine spirits: even the usually dour tecladista did a funny littl dance with El Indio. It's fantastic. If I hadn't already been smiling because the music was sending me to a higher plane; I would have been smiling to see them all having such a good time. Bless.
Next post: not about Manolito.

© Gabriel Wilder 2006