The NEU! closed on Sunday evening at the Girona Auditorium a bittersweet eighth edition – in which, despite having expanded its programming for a month, as a result of the restrictions decreed in December, they had to be canceled. expected actions such as those of Cala Vento o Rufus T. Firefly– with the concert of one of the great living myths of the Spanish independent music scene. The Asturian musician Nacho Vegas arrived in the city in one of the first concerts of the tour of presentation of “Still Worlds Collapsing” (Oso Polita, 2022), an album that deals equally with death, loneliness and the rise of far-right movements around the world, and that connects perfectly with this post-pandemic world that is glimpsed today and in which everything seems to collapse, generating thousands of uncertainties.
With a first part focused mainly on reviewing the new work, with cuts such as “Belart”, “The Gift of Tenderness”, “Stop Time”, “Big Crunch” -a real anti-capitalist anthem with which the former member of Manta Ray regains his most political side- or “Muerre’l branu”, the Asturian version of an original theme John Prine with which the singer-songwriter claims his origins, Nacho Vegas exhibited the great harmony he maintains with the band -formed by Juliane Heinemant, Ferran Resines, Hans Laguna, Manu Molina and the great guitarist Joseba Irazoki– who takes over from the members of the group León Benavente who had accompanied him on the last tours.
The musician from Gijón, who did not hesitate to joke before concluding on the “tongazo” of the Benidorm Fest, dedicated the final part of the recital to reviewing some of the most emblematic hymns of his long career. In this last stretch, pieces like “The Angel Simon” -written following the death of his father-, “The Big Final Joke” or “Pity or Nothing” -saved from the album “El tiempo de las cerezas” (2006), signed jointly with Enrique Bunbury-. The choreography “The Man Who Almost Met Michi Panero” closed the emotional evening that the Saldenc Galdrick opened with the brief presentation of his long debut, “Backlight”, the album that is the first record reference of the new label created by the same festival NEU !.
