Liburuak has reached Mexico along with its entire catalog of books on musical culture of all the world. It is a editorial whose motto is to carry biographies, autobiographiesinvestigations, essaysmanuals or interviews with fans of the soundto the professionals of the entertainment industry.
The brain behind the company from Bilbao is the editorial director Pablo Salgado, who spoke with El Heraldo de México about all the surprises they have prepared for fans on this side of the pond. Starting, of course, with its most recent premiere, a book of Enrique Bunburysinger from Zaragoza, former member of Heroes of Silence, where he gave his entire experience to the fans, answering the letters they sent to his email once he announced his temporary retirement from the stage. His goal was to form new interactions with the people who follow him.
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The Letter of Enrique Bunbury, a book written from the soul
The letter It is precisely part of the collection “Arima” (Soul in Basque), according to Pablo Salgado himself, because it goes beyond the head (essays), the hands (manuals) and the heart (biographies or autobiographies). It is precisely something that has its own life, its soul, and has found its space in that section.
Regarding the reason behind writing an almost autobiographical book, the editor with more than 20 years of experience in the middle, he assures that it is not a writing that he has made from the fearor from the fear of having to abandon concerts, and the contact with fans in live musical experiences, rather it was a farewell that was found in the middle of its adventure a cure for its ills.
It was done from the point of view of a farewell. As you say, Enrique believed that he was never going to be on stage again and he believed that he was never going to have a relationship as direct as the one he has from the stage with the fans, so when he found himself in that situation, well The first thing he did was say well, nothing’s wrong, let’s dedicate ourselves to other arts such as writing.
He was thinking about writing poetry, painting, doing various things and well, it was a way, an attempt to say goodbye a little to the fans. The luck was that it was finally discovered that it was a toxin that generated his illness, beyond the fact that it was something endogenous, it was something exogenous and he was finally cured, did the concerts and decided to move forward with the theme of the book.
When asked about the importance of a book like “The Letter” or the interest that someone who is or is not a fan might have in the life of a being who, although he may be a superstar, is someone completely unknown when it comes to his private affairs, Pablo assured that the book beyond talking about the life of Enrique Bunburyit is a lot of leaves full of experiences enriching which teaches us that we have much more in common with Enrique than we might think.
Because it has a human component that is inherent to all people regardless of whether you are famous or whether you know someone’s life or not, in reality, what Enrique does is answer universal questions through fans, because fans They are interested in the same things that happen to us all, in how you see life, for example, and then well, not only are Enrique’s answers enriching, but the questions from the fans themselves are also very interesting. in many aspects and good in that sense, because I think that the book may interest you regardless of whether you like it or are a fan of Enrique or not.
LIBURUAKa new editorial of rock and roll that reaches Mexico
But Enrique Bunbury He is not the only one who has released books with Liburuak. In fact, they have a wide catalog because they have been operating for just over a year since Europe. Inside your store we can find titles even from the journalist Robin Greenof Ronnie Spector, Paul MCCARTNEY, Lucinda Williams or books about The Cramps, George Michael, Slavery Recordsamong others.
In this sense, Pablo Salgado assures that it is of great relevance that there are books that speak or that document everything that is around the musicbecause it is, beyond a simple writing, a example of life that can inspire many other people, and not only those of us who are fans of the musicbut above all to who we are “life fans”.
When you are reading a book, a biography of an artist, well beyond what it tells you about the art itself, it is telling you how it solved its problems or what the life of the artist in particular is like, and well, well All of these things can’t be heard in a three-minute song. In that sense, I believe that the fact that these types of books and publishers like Liburuak exist is very important for our musical culture, not only in Mexico but worldwide.
Pablo Salgado fervently believes that having a editorial it’s a militant workbecause behind each book that they edit, there is a message that can inspire more than one to follow their own dreams or to see themselves reflected in the words of others who, like them, continue in search of their own. voice.
We are a publishing house and so it depends on the issues that we raise, we are positioning ourselves politically or socially with culture, of course our work is a work, I don’t know if it is militant, but at least cultural and culture always has something militant because What you are creating are not screws, you are creating people and then in that sense you are molding beyond the object alone, it is very important in that sense. We are absolutely dedicated to female voices at this moment and to racialized voices. We find these types of voices very interesting that until now have not had the possibility of being heard and what is up to us beyond giving our opinion is to give a landing strip to all those ideas for a platform from which they can be heard and that In principle it is our publishing house.
But Pablo Salgado is also a writer who has dedicated himself to investigating what is happening in his own scene, in his town, in his surroundings. He has investigated the music with the passion that awakens listening to a harmonya melody and a rhythm. He believes that it is a job that someone must do in everyone, even in Mexicowell a Catalogue of these characteristics will leave its mark and will be important in a few years, when people want to understand a little more about the world in which they live, where what they hear comes from, who invented it, etc.
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It is a responsibility, I think it is my own, it seems to me that if I don’t do it, no one else was doing it at that time and that well, in a way it fell to me out of interest too, because I was interested in knowing the culture. local and local musical culture, it seems to me that it is a job that must be done, that if I don’t do it, someone else will have to do it. In all peoples, in all cultures, there should be people who dedicate themselves to all this almost from an ethnographic point of view so that it reaches future generations; that those generations say hey, well 60 years ago the culture, our culture, the people who lived here listened to this type of things, we made this type of music and there were these types of people who were never famous at all or anything, but well, here is the memory of them.
Lastly, he assured that the speech let each other build around the music that we hear, of the scene we pursue, and of the musicians to those of us who investigate, it will necessarily lead us to know ourselves, to create our own myths and to teach the next generations that not everything is as those who dictate the world tell us. information solely from an advertising, corporate or business point of view.
Pablo Salgado He believed that the closer we get to our scenesand let’s write it, take photographs, videos and help our friends musiciansor at bands that interest us to remain in history, the world will know in a few years that not everything was Paulina Rubio either John Gabrieland that they exist or existed musicians with the same skills, perhaps better, but without the same advertising opportunities.
If we have the ability to praise and create a discourse about the music that interests us, within a few years that will create a discourse and that discourse will mark future generations. So I am sure that each of us has to take the reins of our own discourse, not only personally, but socially, each scene has to document its own work, there have to be fanzines, magazines that Document all this, there must be photographers documenting, people recording videos of the concerts, of the interviews, all this is important to create a breeding ground that in 20, 30, 40 years we can go to that type of materials to know What was there and don’t let the TV tell us that only Paulina Rubio and Juan Gabriel were there.
