Carmen
Fandangos in Space

Who knows how many times a guitar or a flamenco-style chord progression has been used to liven up a track and give it an exotic, gypsy, and intriguing flavor. The list, from Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit" to Queen's "Innuendo" (just to mention two well-known temporal extremes) would be really long, not to mention today's pop, which often basks in Latin and Spanish-like atmospheres, especially as summer approaches.

However, the 70s, as we know, were a whole different story, and it could happen, as in this case, that a band didn't just limit itself to citing motifs and atmospheres, but went further, creating a true fusion of sounds among the most varied, achieving results that are still surprising today. After all, if "raga rock" had already succeeded, why couldn't the experiment give equally convincing results with flamenco? And thus was born the music of Carmen, a half American band (especially in the figure of guitarist-singer David Clark Allen - the true deus-ex-machina of the entire project) and half English (bassist John Glascock played with them, later joining Jethro Tull), which in 1973 released "Fandangos in Space," a small gem that was also blessed by Tony Visconti's production and David Bowie's protection (who, for example, wanted them with him in an episode he managed of Midnight Special - hosted by Amanda Lear).

"Fandangos in Space" offers us a true fusion between high-class prog-rock (and also highly disciplined) and flamenco, which involves, besides the sounds and instrumentation, also the structure of the tracks, the rhythms, the themes tackled, and the interpretation of the entire band (where, for example, the lyrics alternate stanza by stanza in English and Spanish). "Bulerias," the track that opens the album, is a stunning calling card in this sense, an extremely dynamic track that alternates extremely lilting verses (anticipating, in rhythm, certain late 70s pop), choruses in odd times, and sudden breaks entrusted to flamenco guitar, castanets, and interventions of "zapateada" (the tapping of a flamenco dancer's heels), used as a true percussion instrument within the band's ensemble. It's a gripping and emotional track that unfolds in one breath and introduces some leitmotifs that will recur throughout the album and paves the way for two nearly perfect songs: the intense "Bullfight," which in its complex structure and passionate singing dramatically brings us inside a bullfight, and the short but fascinating "Stepping Stone," a ballad with a Spanish flavor and a measured and magical use of keyboards (mellotron and moog, naturally). This traces the path on which the rest of the album unfolds: tracks with an epic flavor and complex narrative structure ("Sailor Song" and "Tales of Spain"), perhaps akin to certain things by Jethro Tull and with a dash of Yes from The Yes Album, all filtered, of course, through a deep Andalusian spirit, or tracks with a deeply emotional character, like the heartbreaking "Lonely House" (certainly the track most anchored in the rock styles of the period). The degree of identification with Andalusian reality surprises in "Por Tarantos," an incredible flamenco guitar solo by Allen (Steve Howe might not come out unscathed from a possible comparison) and in the dreamy "Retirando," which concludes with a wonderful choir with a deep folk flavor (which is then also revisited in the title track). At times it seems to hear anticipations of the best Queen, as in the intricate and sometimes dark "Looking Outside (My Window)" and in "Fandango in Spaces," a track perhaps a bit too composite, but played in a fiery and extremely passionate manner. It all concludes with "Reprise," a fast and fiery conclusion that reconnects to the main theme of "Bulerias," and the melancholic classical guitar chord progression that had already introduced "Tales of Spain."

In hindsight, despite their extreme originality, Carmen was an open chapter and - within two years - quickly closed in the history of rock, passing almost without leaving traces or creating epigones, and in this surely somewhat self-serving. But rediscovering gems of this caliber is a true duty.