Great love was born as Nuno Pico’s solo project. With the arrival of Mariagrep and Clara Redondo they have consolidated themselves as a group and have launched “II”their second album, in which existential anguish and unbridled partying walk hand in hand
Grande Amore was born as a solo project. At what point did you decide to incorporate more people and for what purpose?
Nuno: Let Maria tell it, she’s the boss.
María: At first Nuno went everywhere alone and said he suffered a lot. Months later he invited me to lunch and, very nervous, he told me that we had to talk about something.
N: I was nervous as if I was going to ask her to marry him.
M: He told me it was musical, but I didn’t know if it was recording an album together or another move. In the end he proposed that I become part of Grande Amore.
Clara: He literally rescued me, because I had stopped working in hospitality that day and that call was like an angel fallen from heaven.
N: Write that down in bold.
M: At first one or the other of us went to accompany him live. Until Nuno said: “You are both very good, so I am going to make an effort and I am going to pay both salaries.” Before we only DJed and now we already have samplers, guitars, synths, the table… It’s a much more complete set.
In any case, this new album has been recorded for a long time, so they have not been able to participate in the process yet.
N: Yes, the recording was made months before María even arrived. She still hadn’t even seen her DJ.
“‘Sorry for being so sexy’ people like it and it works well, but we never do it because I literally hate that song”
And how has your contribution influenced when transferring the album to live performances?
M: There are arrangements that are different. My great contribution is that in a super dark song that has, like all of them, “Do my body van be born other bodies”, it occurred to me that we could include a piece of “Saoko”, by Rosalía.
N: The keyboard and the guitar make the riff for “Saoko” (hums) and the truth is that, incredibly, it is very cool. Those kinds of details wouldn’t occur to me alone, honestly. I wouldn’t come to that conclusion. None of the three of us are suspected of being musical virtuosos, but we do come up with those types of things that at first are like an inside joke, but due to the energy that exists between the three of us, they end up happening. If we were a group of three contracted studio musicians, no one would agree to do that. That type of energy is very difficult to achieve from any other point than having a touch of daring. I am very happy that it is like this.
When preparing live shows, do you easily reach agreements on how to approach them or are there disagreements?
N: That agreement… (laughs). Well, there is agreement especially when Josiño – manager of Ernie Records – passes the bills. That’s when there is more agreement. When we say “what a good choice of repertoire”.
M: Nuno is always quite clear. In fact, he doesn’t have a setlist or anything live, he always remembers and is always open to us telling him something.
It is common for the songs you play to vary quite a bit from one concert to another. What do you base your decision on?
N: We took it very rehearsed from the premises. We have a fairly closed repertoire, but we do try, for the sake of having a good time, to have changes from one concert to another, certain variations. Of the old songs, we play the ones that work best, or, at least, the ones that I’m least tired of. Because, for example, ‘Sorry I’m So Sexy’, people like it and it works well, but we never do it because I literally hate that song.
Back to the new album. One difference with the previous one is that, where the other was restrained, this one goes to free escape. There are fewer filters and everything is more immediate. Is it something deliberate?
N: Yes, when producing it, with Carlangas, when we recorded there in Seville with Raúl Pérez, from Pony Pravo, we wanted it to be a little more direct, more raw than the first. The first, as happens to many groups, you don’t know exactly where he is going to go. You have an idea of what you want to do, but you are not as clear about it as once it has already come out. For me Grande Amore now, although I am very happy with it, it does seem to me that it touches on too many themes, that there is a lot of production, many layers. It’s much less raw and peeled than this one. Yes, it was deliberate in that sense. Shorter and more punk songs. Also the lyrics that came out are more bitter, like everything else, more agonizing. We wanted it to be like that and something like that spontaneously came out, which doesn’t always happen. There was that good conjunction and I think that Carlangas’ production has helped a lot in that sense, because it has that minimalist vision. The music we make between the two of us is nothing alike, but he also comes from that, from punk, from the Ramones, although now he makes diametrically opposite music. His contribution has been greatly noted.
It is a very bitter album in its lyrics. Do you feel bad about getting older?
N: I’m the one who has it the worst, for sure.
M: Yes, because he is two years older than us and he always talks to us as if he were fifteen years older than us.
N: But in that year and months I have suffered a lot. I had a very bad time. I saw a lot of things (laughs)
M: The truth is that I have had a pretty happy life.
N: That would be a good headline, it would be the least expected headline in history. But yes, I have a terrible time. And every year it gets worse, because I’m older, of course.
M: I love getting older, but I don’t like the passage of time.
N: If I could stay in this year forever, but not forever, but die like everyone else. But reaching 90 years old like I am now. I would freak out. It is the best year for me of personal fulfillment that I have ever had. I like the songs we release now, I enjoy the live performance. Really enjoyed it. There are still no quarrels in the group to make the concerts a traumatic experience. If it were every year like this one I would sign a lot.
Is it possible that a big part of the group’s success lies in the fact that there are a lot of people having a bad time?
N: Yes (laughs). But I think Grande Amore would make the same music that he makes now in 2007, just the last good year in which there was money, there was no crisis, etc. What happens is that now the threshold of misery in the world has risen so much and everyone is so screwed that now people do think “look how right these letters are.” Even if it were a happier time we would do the same thing, only no one would say anything. Since now there is no longer that opportunity to get paid, to be happy and everything is devastated and lost, the lyrics and attitude make more sense. People see themselves reflected, but not so much because we do anything especially because we want to be icons of a hurt generation. When we are together most of the time we are laughing, we have a great time. It is not something sought or something done on purpose, but right now composing ‘El Venao’ is complicated the way the world is.
“Yes, I would like for the new music to have the participation of all three in the recordings”
Has there been anything musically that you haven’t dared to do or that hasn’t come out yet?
C: A little vocal technique if we lacked it sometimes, for certain versions (laughs).
N: What excites me most about Grande Amore is that everything is done from a point of view that is not close to musical orthodoxy, but that it really works. It’s not doing it wrong for the sake of doing it wrong.
M: I think we dare with everything.
N: It is not that we expressly make a claim for rarities, bizarreness and randomness. I don’t think any of the three of us defend that, but it is true that there are things that we want to do that are fun and that fit into the group’s universe. Why don’t we do it?
M: The funny thing is that whatever you do, do it to the fullest and without hesitation.
The three of you have been working together for several months now. Has there been time for new material that you all participate in?
N: At the moment, no. Yes, I would like for the new music to have the participation of all three in the recordings. But for that you have to make the songs first. Without songs things are screwed. In the end I think a big part of how the group is working now is the energy we have. I’m looking forward to the experience of being out there for a few days recording.
So there hasn’t been any progress since you finished recording the album in March of last year?
N: Yes I have ideas of how I want the album to sound. But what takes me the most time, by far, is imagining how I want it to be, having the sound or style references. I think that if you have that it is easier for the rest to come easily. I have noticed it a lot when producing this album with Carlangas. It’s not that we had and will certainly never have incredible technical knowledge, but we did know where we wanted to go, what groups we liked and who we wanted to be like in spirit. I’m in that process of knowing who to copy, basically (laughs)
A lot has happened since we interviewed you for Mondo Sonoro on the occasion of the first preview of the first album. If there is a third interview, what do you think will happen during that time?
N: I hope it doesn’t happen as much between the second album and the third as between the first and the second. The thing is that from the outside I don’t know how it has been, because a year or so without getting anything out may seem like a lot, but from the inside it has been hectic. We have not stopped spinning at any time. First just me, then the two of us (points to María). Then put together the repertoire with Clara. It seems like we’ve been playing together for five years and we started in April. It’s like they are my sisters. Where are we going to be in a year or so? Namely. Maybe we don’t even talk to each other.
Has the pace of concerts been so frenetic?
N: To give you an idea, soon, I don’t know when, there will be the 100th Grande Amore concert. At the end of the year, in December, something like that.
M: We will have to do something, we have to have a party.