Ricky Gil: Infinite routes to keep listening

--What are you going to have?

--Two beers, at least.

Musician, translator, and writer, Ricky Gil leans against the bar, eager to talk about his projects, the things he likes, and this Barcelona "so contradictory and that we are so lucky to share." Through the background music glides the hypnotic Groove of O Caminho de Bem, by Tim Maia, with that unique phrasing by Paulinho 'Guitarra', and a feeling that everything is going as it should prevails.

"I am a man born in Barcelona many years ago. I have mainly dedicated myself to music, playing in bands, writing, doing radio. But, since all this has been and is quite underground, I have always worked as a translator from English to Catalan and Spanish," explains the one who is or has been a member of bands like Brighton 64, Brigatones, Matamala or Top Models, author of the acclaimed volumes Bola y Cadena and Enhorabona pel Programa and host of the program Guitarra, Baix i Bateria on the local radio of La Garriga, where he lives with his wife and their eight-year-old twins.

With the bulk of his musical career linked to his brother, also musician and writer Albert Gil (the third party, Ariadna, is the famous actress), Ricky is currently preparing the launch of his first solo album accompanied by "one of the best rock bands in Catalonia", Biscuit, and with "high-profile collaborators", such as producer Paco Loco or singer-songwriter Joana Serrat. "Infinites Rutes Invisibles has a very powerful blues-rock-psychedelia vibe, a bit far from the accelerated rhythms we practice with Brighton 64."

Subcultural epiphanies

Ricky Gil's connection with music goes way back, "to the day I decided to form a band with a school friend and start playing bass. It was undoubtedly an important turning point, because almost everything that has come after stems from that crazy idea." That was the beginning of a journey whose coordinates were marked by many experiences and travels: "in England I discovered Mod culture when I was very young, a reference I always keep in mind."

During the 80s, the Gil brothers, fronting Brighton 64, ascended to the Olympus of Spanish Pop, brushed with success and, victims of an industry alien to the underground, fell only to re-emerge, in the following decade, under other projects and names, on a journey that would end in this very decade with the relaunch of the original band, bringing back their old hits, but above all recording new songs, new albums, new stories and routes to sail.

"I'm glad to have been able to transmit and share our vision with so many people. What we have to offer is quite rare, it's not for everyone, but that has allowed us to do what we wanted. Despite the difficulties, we have been very fortunate."

--- Man, it's also many years that you've put in effort

--Viewed in perspective, I would highlight the constancy I've had in doing things non-stop. I've released many albums and two books, I haven't stopped playing live until the pandemic arrived. We always have something on our hands, at the risk of becoming tiresome for people who have known us for a long time. I suppose if I hadn't shared most of my career with my brother Albert, who has prodigious energy, I would have taken it more calmly. But I'm happy with this reality.

Barcelona Blues

From life in La Garriga, Ricky misses, "this city that has been very battered, like so many others, by abuses of power" and of which he loves its numerous historical episodes of general revolt or massive resistance against the authorities. "There have been many and some very recent."

There is a note of sadness, in reviewing a city afflicted by "the disappearance, due to speculation, of places where our personal history was written." And, as "the most devastating symbol" Ricky recalls the historic instrument and sheet music store Musical Emporium "today converted into a horrendous currency exchange shop, for tourists who no longer exist these days".

I have enjoyed Barcelona to the fullest and I hope Barcelona has enjoyed me, because we have dedicated a lot of effort to it

And it is inevitable, then, to think of that early hit with which the Gil brothers debuted in the early 80s, an imperishable anthem of this metropolis, Barcelona Blues. That first milestone on a path that still has a long way to go, full of music, lyrics and infinite possibilities.