After more than a decade of irregular activity, The lighthouse They light up again and offer us their renewed return, using the rawest emotion as an ignition fuse. With the shadow support of Lisandro Montes (Dorian) and Sergio Acosta (Zoé), the Tenerife band now publishes its new EP, “A Strange Peace” (Intromúsica/Watercolor, 23).
“A Strange Peace” It is a moving journey of four tracks through which they dare to reflect on the role that sadness and fear play in our lives, and in the process, experience unprecedented cadences in their style, driven by optimism and resilience. Carlos Díaz, in the company of Alejandro and Eduardo, meet with us to tell us more about his new work.
El Faro’s journey has had many peaks and valleys. How do you feel the path has been to get here?
(Carlos) I feel like our career has been the result of a series of accidents, frankly. I started making songs when I was very young, back in 2010, and since then things haven’t stopped happening to us, almost by chance. We released our first demo, Acuarela signed us, we played with Daniel Johnston… Everything happened to us and very quickly, but it didn’t take long for that stage to close. After that, I went to study in Madrid, the group dissipated, and it was not until 2018 that the band regrouped again, this time with a new lineup. Actually, we haven’t been around as many years as it seems, if you start to discount those valleys of inactivity and the time that we have been inoperative due to the pandemic and so on. Practically, you could say that we are even a new group.
A pandemic that anyone would say you saw coming, publishing “The Bad Years” in February 2020, no less.
(Carlos) Well, the song talked about a series of bad years that had already passed, of course. It was intended to be understood as a closing touch to a very bad personal stage. Then we realized that we had been deluded and that the real bad years were still to come. [risas].
(Alejandro) I, in fact, met the boys around that time and I always say that before I met them, the world was a better place. It won’t have anything to do with it, but what a coincidence [risas].
“Whenever I compose I keep in mind the false illusion of believing that no one will ever listen to what I write”
Ironies aside, now you present your new work, “Una Paz Extraña”. What can you tell us about that enigmatic title?
(Carlos) Really “a strange peace” is exactly what one feels after listening to the four songs on the EP in perspective. These were composed over the course of a year, and they capture quite well the desire we had to reflect the sensations that this particular trip left us with. One that ranges from the most toxic optimism to the acceptance of sadness as just another part of life. The EP is the result of having found a peace that is not exactly what I imagined, but one that at least convinces me. I feel better than I did at the beginning, and I feel like something has changed, but it’s not quite what I expected. It’s… a strange peace, no more, no less.
It is true that the EP begins very lively, as you say, with “Algo Bueno” which has what it takes to be a potential hit.
(Carlos) “Something Good” feels almost like a pat on the back, honestly. A push that I try to give myself, to come up. Although we end up saying goodbye in the following songs [risas]. Our music has never been blatantly sad, but we’re not a particularly happy band either. The body asked us to do this exercise of honesty, that is why there have been no qualms when it comes to opening up. And I must say that, on a personal note, when I feel most inspired is when I am bad. If we tried, we could be even sadder, but in all our songs we tend to see the bright side of things.
Is that level of confidence when it comes to letting go the result of experience or have you always understood music from that emotional side?
(Carlos) Whenever I compose I keep in mind the false illusion of believing that no one will ever listen to what I write, which is why the songs end up having such an explicit meaning in the lyrics. They are born from very intimate moments, and I rarely change anything about them after the fact. I don’t like handling them, I leave them as they are, with the intention of reflecting the original moment in which they were conceived.
(Alejandro) Although Carlos is the one who assumes responsibility for the composition, I think that how we are with each other also has a lot to do with the final result of the songs, beyond just being a band. Not only are we a group of kids who have gotten together to play, but we are also friends and we have no problems opening up to each other and expressing our feelings without barriers. In the end that also has an impact on what our songs are like and how they come from the depths and hit the nerves. We are used to sharing with each other everything that happens to us and, once we enter into that dynamic, stage fright is also lost.
A dynamic in which two big names with a lot of experience have also taken part, Lisandro de Dorian and Sergio de Zoé. How has it been having them in the production of the EP?
(Carlos) It has been an incredible experience, and they have contributed everything that can be contributed and more. We had already worked on the songs quite a bit on our own, so you could say that we arrived at the studio with our homework done and knowing more or less what we wanted. Even so, the help of Lisandro and Sergio was essential. They are two true geniuses who did everything they could to make the songs sound exactly the way we wanted and helped us a lot to shape sounds that seem almost new to our repertoire. It is very exciting to see how that small demo that we composed one day at my house, when there was still a curfew, has ended up arriving in such a beautiful place, thanks to your hand and that of the people involved in mixing and mastering. We feel like children who are wearing new shoes, really.
You talk about unpublished sounds, such as, for example, those electronic arrangements that we perceive in the final part of “Algo Bueno”, right?
(Carlos) That turn in vocal arrangements and sound designs comes precisely from the music we listen to. More than any other instrument, the voice is currently the most important element in pop music, and personally I am a big fan of those types of artists who are able to play with their voice in an ingenious way, twisting and manipulating it, like Bon Iver or James Blake. Furthermore, shortly before starting to compose the EP I got deeply into hyperpop. It is not something that I wanted to transfer to El Faro directly, since our rawest and most acoustic side still prevails, but in one way or another our influences always end up being perceived.
And what can you tell me about your native Tenerife? Has it also influenced you?
(Carlos) The mere fact of living here already influences you. The environment, the climate, the lifestyle… Tenerife is a very particular environment. I think that has ended up having an impact on the fact that our songs are not strict and direct. Furthermore, I really like taking the car and going to write there, so in my head a very clear relationship is generated between music and landscape, where sometimes the Island ends up becoming a more inspiring environment than an outdoor studio. use.
Taking into account that we have only known El Faro’s music through the short format, do you think we are any closer to listening to one of your albums?
(Carlos) More than searching for it, the short format has found us. Whether due to circumstantial issues, it has always happened that we have felt more comfortable releasing our music this way. But of course we would like to release an LP in the future. In fact, I think this is the best time to seriously consider it. Remember, never before have we had so much material laid out and ready to publish.
(Edu) The pandemic has also had a lot of influence on that, of course. At that time Carlos took advantage of the time to investigate and since then he has been very involved in the production. Right now we have a much more professionalized work process and that has helped us to be in constant creation.
(Carlos) Of course, I would say that that is what has changed and influenced the activity of El Faro the most today. The fact of having a small personal studio at home to layout and tweak the songs as we wish, playing with them and learning. This is what has made us feel more productive than ever and we have a lot of enthusiasm to remain committed to the project.