After decreeing the yellow alert for rains on Thursday in Benidorm and Valencia in general, the Low Festival has inaugurated its 15th edition dodging the bad weather and receiving one of the best temperatures that are remembered at the festival. The experience in the Guillermo Amor Sports City of Benidorm has been unbeatable in this first day, mainly thanks to a program that has alternated popular and alternative groups, in which Xoel López has been as poster’s head as Pet Shop Boys.
When Carolina during They called their album ‘Choose your own adventure’ (2024) we did not know that one of the adventures included in this game involved Diego Ibáñez acting exalted with a crutch in front of a scenography that recreates the yellow wall office of Camera Café (he later makes a coffee prepares). In case it was not enough surrealism, a ‘monster’ covered with posters (unlocked phobia, thanks) appears on the stage to make monerías. He is not the only guest to the concert: the Petunias, who will act later, put themselves in the role of Rosalia to sing ‘normal’ with the Madrid.
But the best thing about the Carolina show during -Apart of the visible physical improvement of Diego Ibáñez, who acts with a crutch instead of two- is the discreet place that occupies ‘Cayetano’ in his repertoire. In fact, this song sounds in the Ecuador of the concert. Now it is the strokes of ‘You probably are right’, ‘I thought that God had touched me’, the aforementioned ‘normal’ or ‘hamburgers’ that cause fury … and pogos. Friendly pogos, yes: with a crutch on stage is enough.
Xoel López It acts in front of a landscape of groups of friends dressed with tropical shirts and striking prints, a festival tradition very present in the Low, where it is especially common to see groups attending matching dresses. Interestingly, López and his group also appear together on stage, but they wear a suit. A stylistic decision that gives personality to its live, since it is not so common to see groups dressed in this way.
The tropical spirit of ‘Spirit Broth’ (2023) becomes evident in songs like ‘Fort da’, but the choruses of ‘The brave love’ or the triumphal ‘are also chanted. López, who carries a harmonica placed on the neck, marks large alone with this instrument, although they are the overwhelming percussions of ‘a serea eo mariñeiro’ those that take the concert to its peak. Its scenario is to overflow because the public connects both with its effusive melodies, and with the elegance of the entire proposal.
The political protest has also taken place in the Low: a Palestinian flag crowned Carolina’s stage during, and a Ukrainian is projected at the beginning of the show of Pet Shop Boys. However, the Pet Shop Boys show is political only implicitly through the claim of sexual and/or affective freedom of many of their songs. Perhaps also the futurism of its musical productions and its scenographic assembly point to a kind of utopia, a paradise to go when reality weighs too much.
That paradise to which Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe take us, which, stylized with their usual silver gabardines and metal masks in the shape of a fingerboard, look like knights of the future arriving to save the humanity of the abyss. Two lights illuminated at night crown the stage and, while the screens project visual modern and light games, the repertoire of Pet Shop Boys fulminates a success after another, while their renewed band interprets the songs with great professionalism.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve seen this concert several times because Pet Shop Boys classics continue to work thanks to their timeless Synth-Pop and their easy choruses. Anyone who listened to ‘Dancing’ or ‘Paninaro’ for the first time will stay immediately with their melodies. And he who is familiar with all his successes will still freak out with the supreme elegance of ‘West End Girls’ or ‘It’s a Sin’. The House of ‘The Pop Kids’ and, above all, the high Edm of ‘Alright’, insert the direct Pet Shop Boys today to which they also belong. They sing that “music is forever” and yours, without a doubt, is.
There is also something timeless in the approach of Sexy Zebras to the sounds of rock ‘n roll and the garage rock of the past. They recreate it not only with grace, but their vocalist Gabriel Montes makes a spectacular frontman role. Talking about charisma is already a cliché, so I will mention the visible mastery of the scenario of an already very experienced group that inhabits the energy of the original Roll Roll as if it took it under the skin, and that, with the apotheosic choirs of «Vamos Nena, Jaleo, Jaleo» or that “I sweat it to me what you say” of ‘Days of shit’, especially knows the chime.
Stereo bomb They land Low with the task of waking an audience that resists arrival at dawn. They get it with an esoteric show, decorated are giant mushrooms and burning candles, and based on their usual fusion of Latin and Caribbean rhythms with Synth-Pop and electronics, and more focused on elaborating progressive developments than I remember from other concerts of the Colombian band.
The idea works thanks to the instrumental wealth present on the stage, which includes drums, flutes and maracas played live, and a variety of influences that goes from cumbia to the merengue house of ‘Shark’, a fun and unexpected – or perhaps not so much – project version one. Music is so tangible and visual that it is easy to forget the darkness of the stage: a li perceive. His voice, yes, feels.
Li Saumet emerges on the stage by blowing a bunch of Salvia and, in ‘Pájaro’, one of those songs that Simón Mejía and company extend for long and hypnotic minutes, dances as possessed under a tower of laser lights that seems to want to abduce it. Saumet is responsible for keeping the party well up, but also of impregnating the spirituality show, inviting the public to think about the love he has in his life, even if he is himself, and ignore those who criticize without foundation. In ‘This is me’, Saumet claims to have chosen his own path: “In this life I did what I wanted, and now I am here,” he says. Noelia Núñez has left the conversation.
The show starts with Tecnazo, although you have to put a but, that the transitions between songs do not flow as well as they should. Stereo bomb supply this inconvenience thanks to how well greased that their instrumental jams sound. The show is soon immersed in the evocative rhythms of Latin Synth-Pop of ‘To My Love’ or in the ecstasy of ‘Fiesta’. Then, the madness of percussions of ‘fire’ lead the show to the climax before the communion of ‘beautiful eyes’ arrives. The greatest triumph of a stereo bomb is that his proposal for tropical futurism has no rival in terms of popular acceptance, and, above all, it is currently not being able.
