Interview with Rafa Balmaseda (Paralisis Permanente) by David Kiss

At the beginning of the 80s, a musical movement was born in Spain called the Movida Madrileña, mostly pop groups established in the city of Madrid, although there were also groups from other parts of the country, such as Galicia, Barcelona, ​​the Basque Country ...
Spain woke up from a dictator and rapidly evolved the world, culturally, intellectually and as a non-musical ... Anglo-Saxon influences were latent, many people traveled to London, the capital of punk, after punk at that time, dominated the musical style of those moments, influencing many young people from around the world ..
In those days a group called Paralisis Permanente appears with its charismatic leader Eduardo Benavente, they revolutionize the musical panorama of that moment, recording some single and an album called "El Acto", which after being published, having closed almost 90 closed concerts in the form of state tour a traffic accident at the beginning of the tour takes its leader Eduardo Benavente, remaining as a punk cult album or after punk singing in Spanish and claimed by many people generations after the band's destruction.
But there are still several survivors of that band, such as Ana curra keyboard player and our bass player in the mythical band, and she is again in the news for her recent participation as a group Los Ejemplares that accompanies another character Txarly Usher.
I met Rafa at a concert by Ana Curra presenting "El Acto" by Paralisis Permamente, remembering that presentation that cut short the career and disappearance of the group, the social network has made us occasionally exchange words and emotionally I became more attached to his career as musician, knowing many Latin American Bathoryzine.com readers are interested in this interview.

 -What do you remember from your first beginnings in music? What were those records that influenced you at that time?
Well I started very young at 14 years old ... then the groups that were playing or that were heard by my older brothers were Beatles .. Rollings..Slade ... T Rex..David Bowie etc ... Although I I've always been more of a Rollings than the Beatles! (laughs)




-You have an older brother who teaches you some riff with a tombola guitar! (laughs), but quickly you go to the bass, why?
No, this is not so! (laughs)… .I have an older brother who played drums in a group of friends and they needed a bass player, they put on an acoustic guitar with 4 strings and thanks to the guitarist I started to learn to play something, then the rest will come out! (laughs) but I had to learn to play the guitar too! capoes and stuff! (laughs)

-You set up a band called Negative, opening for Triana, Saxon and Colosseum that their guitarist at that time was Gary Moore !!, music that had nothing to do with you, did the audience behave well with you? , I say this mainly because in the early 80s, if the bands were not in the same musical style, they used to suffer licks from the audience! (laughs ,,,)
Well people behaved because they didn't come to see us either! (Laughs)



-You arrive in Madrid and settle there for a better opportunity as a musician, in the midst of Madrid, you do a little with Derribos Arias, with Glutamate YeYe…. With Negative you record a song for the soundtrack “Arrebato” by Ivan Zuelueta .. tell me?

Yes Borja the singer DEP of the group. Iván DEP's brother… we are asked to make a song for the film Arrebato. The song is titled "Anxiety", that takes us to Madrid ... we are there for a season but nothing flows and we end up separating as a band.


-One thing leads you to another, you know Eduardo Benavente and….

Well luckily to stay in Madrid one night I see Eduardo at Rockola, I go in and tell him that if he needs a bass player that I would like to play with him ... he proved me being the rest history.

-Eduardo Benavente had a band called Prisma with Nacho Cano de Mecano, then he formed Permanent Paralasis with Nacho Canut, Johnny Canut, who were also part of Alaska and Pegamoides, I think there was also Jaime Urrutia who would later form Gabinete Galigari, in the end he was a hard core that dismembered in most bands that dominated the Madrid scene, he always said that his group was Post Punk, did you consider his music encompassed in that style? You replace Nacho Canut and Permanent Paralysis is ahead of most of the groups that created music at that time in Spain ...

Well I have always considered Paralisis an afterpunk group.

And replacing Nacho was a success for me! (Laughs), I managed to play with the group that I liked the most in the world! (Laughs).

- Do you always talk in your interviews that you were a fan of Paralisis Permanente, over the years I imagine that you have realized how important it was to play in the band, its legacy endures in the new punk, gothic, sinister Spanish and Latin American generations?
And in this one I also say it… ..fan, I keep listening to his songs and playing them… apart from important, I think that among all of us who love Permanent Paralysis we are the ones who keep that flame burning to all that legacy.


- Enrique dies and I imagine that your life is empty, dark, a future of expectations collapse with that tragic accident…., Having a future of good expectations, with more than 90 signed galas, you are almost out of work ..
Besides, I lost a friend who was the most important and the hardest.

- You collaborate with Speed ​​and Vidas Ejemplares ...

If with Speed ​​on my return to my city I play and record an LP. Vidas Ejemplares  is somewhat more personal, recording another LP.


-I think you collaborate with Ana Curra in her project Seres Vacíos in which I think you are united by a great friendship ...

At that time if I collaborated with her I actually continue with her until the thing stopped working.

   Parálisis Permanente - Autosuficiencia
  
-Then or sooner you play with Ariel Rot in "Debajo del puente" ...

Well that was what I composed with 3l the song ... but I never got to play with it.
-There are also Dosis Gray ,,,,
Dosis Gray is a group where I spent a season recording an ep.

 -You are again in the news when Ana calls you to present "El Acto" of Paralisis Stay in Spain and remove that thorn from the 80s, s
Yes… it was fine while it lasted.
-What a thrill it produces to see everything again, former colleagues from other bands, I imagine that although your son is a child he must hallucinate many things ...
 Yes! (laughs) Now the songs of Txarly Usher and Los Ejemplares are sung, before they were those of Paralisis Permanente!! (laughs)
-This interview is due to your new involvement in the band Los Ejemplares, a band that accompanies Txarly Usher ... how do you contact you? What joint idea do you pursue? When does the album come out and what does it contribute to the musical world?
Los Ejemplares .... I just stopped playing with Ana Curra ... and Txarly called me for a new project, she signed up because there is a lot of desire to play together.
The album has already come out and we are very happy, although given the situation of the virus it has been twisted into all things, waiting for them to return to their place.
-Txarly is very influenced by Paralisis Permanente, I imagine that playing with a band member must be a brutal feeling for him ..
Man! Txarly is a fan of mine and I of him !! (laughs)

-I imagine that it would not have been difficult for you to have joined him, because Enrique Benavente's influences are latent in Usher ...
Nothing difficult, we are both from the same school.

                                              Txarly Usher y Los Ejemplares

 

 -What future plans do you have immediately?For now prepare the show well.
-We are ending the interview, but I wanted to ask you, after having lived a part of the musical history in Spain, having left so many people dead, because of excesses, are you glad to be a survivor?Of course I am privileged! (Laughs).
My interviews end with a series of questions about your musical tastes
-First album that you bought in a store and age?Pufff I think it was the Ballroom Blitz "of The Sweet ... 16 years?

  PARALISIS PERMANENTE -  Directo  Musical Express

 -First concert that you attended? 

At what age?Well, he is among the Ramones, The Clash and Iggy pop 19 years old.
-What is the best concert you have attended as a public?

The Lords Of The New Church  Killing Joke.
    

                                        

                                       Rafa Balmaseda

                    

Interview by David Kiss