Chambao
Endorfinas en la mente

The chambao, in the Andalusian dialect, is a kind of makeshift tent that people set up on the beach to shield themselves from the sun and wind. I’ve been to Andalusia and didn’t see a single one, but here in Sicily where I live, there are plenty of chambaos, although I’m not sure of the correct local dialect name, if there even is one. In Sicily, the chambao is truly a living space in which the grandmother reigns like a matron. Wearing a seventies floral swimsuit, the grandmother and her flabby belly keep watch over the portable fridge, the sandwiches with Nutella melted by the heat, the panettone bought in February with a ten-for-one offer, and of course, the obligatory tray of baked pasta. The queen of the chambao is tasked with safeguarding the food, calling everyone, young and old, to the inevitable meal between swims, and ensuring the proper closure of the nest when, away from prying eyes, one is busy unwrapping sandwiches oozing with brown cream, opening beer bottles with their teeth and burying the caps under the sand with their foot, carefully shaking powdered sugar onto pandoro, and, of course, licking the aluminum foil of the lasagna where some sauce and a few peas are stuck. In exchange for this constant vigilance, during her stay in the chambao, the grandmother receives shade from the sun, coolness, and the freedom to scratch herself in peace, in full privacy. Often, the Sicilian beach is dotted with such colorful and vibrant mini-habitations, and more than just a temporary place of amusement, the beach seems to become a social experiment, the reproduction of a matriarchal society, or rather “grandmotherly.”

Andalusia and Sicily, so close, multi-ethnic lands blessed by the sun, wind, and sea, populations with boiling blood and the worn-out Catholicism of those who first attend every Lent procession and then have their cards read by the neighborhood psychic. So close, with the Spanish region having long been a land for laundering dirty money made in Southern Italy... Yet so distant, the two Mediterranean regions, if we only think that the chambao here where I stay is something to laugh about while, on the other side, Chambao is the proud name of one of the happiest artistic realities in Europe.

Born in 2001, the trio led by María del Mar presents a skillful and intuitive mix of flamenco and modern music. Setting aside the dance ambitions of the Gipsy Kings, they prefer to immerse their musical roots in an amniotic liquid made of chill out and electronic music. Although del Mar coined this subgenre with the band’s moniker, this style goes by the less original but much more precise name of “Flamenco Chill,” an eloquent definition if we consider that such is the title of a 2002 compilation including six tracks from the then newly-formed Chambao, who practically curated the selection of the songs, theirs and others, to be included in the tracklist!

“Endorfinas En La Mente," from the following year, was hugely acclaimed by critics and the public, awarding del Mar with widespread recognition and credit throughout Europe, even in Albion. Listening to it, and studying the structure of the songs, one notices the multiple compositional and stylistic solutions that make Chambao strong: sometimes it’s pure flamenco spiced with sound effects and keyboards in line with the best electronic production, sometimes it sounds like playful and relaxed (perhaps even inferior) light music with ethnic tinges; often the verses - I should say "letras" - are ethnic and the chorus is pop, and in some cases, it’s exactly the opposite. There are many more solutions and forms in this album, mind you, but I believe one can't expect to be precise when flamenco itself is born from three different cultures that marry, is transmitted orally, is not just a music genre but a dance and painting style, has an estimated age of five centuries, has been studied in Spanish conservatories for just over two decades, and has more than fifty subcategories, not to mention the so-called “aflamencados,” that is, types of music (and dances) that are flamenco but also derive from other genres, the most famous of which is the fandango, so dear to Kevin Kostner and Luciano Ligabue... Faced with all this complexity and abundance, the amateur reviewer cannot help but hesitate.

And then also "chill": what does "chill" mean? Is chill-out a music genre, or a way of playing? In chill out compilations, I’ve found ambient music, new age, subliminal relaxation, ethnic pieces, stuff more inclined to a raga-rock band, pieces from bands doing dub, trip hop, world-renowned artists, and unknown DJs remixing; bossa nova, Native American chants, Tibetan prayers, lo-fi sixties-style lounge... And rock music, as well as funky or soul, certainly refined, made non-alcoholic, but songs with that kind of progression. So, with flamenco and chill out, how can a flamenco-chill song come about if not in a thousand different ways?

Setting aside technicalities and focusing on sensations, I admit without hesitation that the sound of Chambao is rewarding and complex, it’s reconciling yet tense, one foot in two shoes. María’s voice is that of a traditional young singer (no hoarseness like the Reyes brothers and no voices from aged women in decades-long andropause), and this continuous and bright assertiveness on the musical carpet (I should say "compás") moves the listener away from the nightmare (at least for me) of extremist documentary world music, then projects him into a more pop (chill, in this case) dimension where that tone is nothing else and can’t be better than a wonderful trademark.

From a rhythmic standpoint, flamenco in four-four time is chosen to better fit the acoustic sounds and the singing meter within the mood created by electronics which, often, in the compás, completely replaces the tradición guitars, justifiably stepping aside to allow the little guitar to phrase once in a while between verses or offer a falsetto, a solo that is.

The emblematic track, the most famous one that the Andalusian region has obviously used for a tourist spot is “Ahí Estás Tú,” where we can see what Chambao is capable of when they push it to the limit. The track is very rarefied and stylish, the bases and almost everything about the song are chill and of great taste, flamenco is only left in the vocalization skirting the edge of the flat note that del Mar offers us at the end of almost every verse. The track, however, instead of a mere fade-out, implodes into a vigorous "tragic sing," so strong and proud it seems like the vocalization of a muezzin, and the beauty is that it rises above a syncopated space-rock rhythm on the edge of sci-fi, where sampled castanets and fake escobillas, i.e., the dancers’ tapping on the ground, are grafted. Flamenco in space. And beautiful music, wherever it is played. Even if it were played in Sicily.

When, at eighteen, I found myself in Torremolinos, I asked myself why go on a trip to Andalusia if it was like being in Sicily. Then when I ended up in bed with a Finnish looker, I answered myself that Sicily and Andalusia had absolutely nothing to do with each other, absolutely nothing at all... When I went to the beach, I didn’t find any chambao, but for that matter, I didn’t find any beach: a tidal wave had carried away the shore, and there was finely ground earth dumped there. The beach was brown, you know? In Sicily, only sandwich paper is that color... And occasionally water. At least I hope so, occasionally. This summer, where I live, only a couple of days, it's rumored due to a hotel pipeline break on the coast, but it’s not official news.

To this day, I ask God and myself why a land also made of vetero-Catholic men and women with hot blood can systematically outperform us Sicilians, in every field and in this way. In particular, I think of Andalusia and I wonder why there the tent mentioned at the beginning has a seductive name and shelters young artists who make love in the shade and write splendid songs mixing tradition with modernity, while here where I am, the old stuff and Ferragosto lasagnas are inside.

What went wrong in Sicily?