“After performing at Coachella, what I noticed most was the Spanish color palette.”

“I’m still looking for my first dog, my aunt’s dog’s son. He is fourteen years old and I have been with him for half my life,” the Madrid musician says of his partner Lucas, an animal with a presence and importance “difficult to explain” in his life, having been part of his “nature” for so long, and now too old to be part of an album cover whose name, more than the technological impotence of dogs, alludes to Wisdom is to sit and look at the clouds without feeling the attack of anxiety. A title that no emotionless person could glimpse, even if that’s what it says in parentheses.

In fact, it’s Marcus’s forte, who is in his 20s From his room in Vallecas, he knew how to decode the suffering of generations, to make thousands of listeners imprisoned by the epidemic cry.And after five years have passed, he has not lost that gift in light of the comments raised by his new material.

“I’ve been listening to you since 2020, I’ve grown with you, and this album made me want to change, writes one fan online. “I don’t know what to do with my life, the only thing that makes me happy is listening to this album,” “Another reason to stay alive,” say two others. And one is like the cherry on top: “My mother died the day this album came out, and her songs were like a hug I couldn’t give her.”

“Oh, the last one is devastating,” admits Crespo. “How can I take a compliment like that? Well, without thinking about it too much, because if I thought about it seriously it would stress me out a lot. If I gave it the importance it has, I think I wouldn’t be able to sleep.

It is often said that the more sensitivity, the more suffering. The more a musician suffers, the better music comes out. Their first album bore a lot of suffering, and although this new work is in that sense less “dodgy”, so to speak, it is just as good or even better.

Less bad, in what sense?

Less oppressive.

Well, that’s what it’s about. It doesn’t mean it’s any less bad, I think it’s worse, what happens is that he stops being so oppressive and isolated, and starts being more emotional.

As if assuming what exists is more flexible.

Yes, suddenly you start being able to deal with those feelings that you had blocked. I find that more evasive because it is more blunt.

I think one aspect that makes it less oppressive is that he modulates his voice more now, and starts singing, instead of reading monotonously.

Yes. I also learned to sing something else, which is important (laughs). There are certain things that are easier to express in this way. The fact that it’s a more lyrical album evokes this feeling of being less oppressive. It arises from the search for other kinds of moments, feelings and intentions in music.

There are lyrics on the album that came from spending time on social media and studying people’s online behaviors. As for the career of a musician, I’ve read that one of the most eye-opening things is seeing so many new groups obsessed with numbers, “target audience”, etc…

It must have been a tweet I posted when I was feeling stressed about something. Yes, I see a lot of bands that are starting to focus on social media more than the music industry. If you’re a musician, the important thing is the music. You can’t expect your music to hit the ground running and make a living from it because you made a funny Tiktok record or because you’re a heavy social media user. The beauty of it all, and the reason you advance as a musician, is the songs. We’ve all seen those artists who, once they start, release a video that goes viral, and most of them disappear very quickly. People who have a long career do so because they have an interesting artistic offering. You can have a viral effect, but if you don’t have good music, if it’s not coming from a real place, everything will be complicated for you. You also get good music and networks with millions of followers, so be the master. There are many cases. But first things first.

“From my collaboration with Bb Trickz, something very naive, very fun and very silly came out. It’s so nice to hear in the background. “I find it very funny”

It reminded me of those Movida years when people started making compilations without knowing how to play any instrument, just to be cool.

It has always happened. There have always been kids with guitars who wanted to have sex with them, and there have always been people who used music as a means to something else, not as an end in itself.

I’ve read that at some point he felt like the numbers were affecting his creative process, and he said to himself something like “Shut up, stop, I can’t go here.”

Yes, because suddenly you find yourself in a vortex where everyone doesn’t stop releasing music, now this works, now this works, they eat your head with trends… They never tell me what to do, I’m very happy in Sonido Muchacho. But yeah, you hear things and sometimes you wonder if you could do better because of this or that. It’s a confusing moment when you get off track, and right before I made this album, there was this moment where I sat down and said, “Look, all of this doesn’t matter at all,” and decided to make a record that I liked, and that I enjoyed. But yes, this could happen to you, because I see groups that seem to be trying to create a formula that is not their own, and therefore not real. But the public is not stupid. If you’re into the mainstream, you can try playing another game, but not us.

What influences did performing at Coachella have? Did you feel like it was a turning point?

Above all, I felt the Spanish painting. I do better in Latin America and the US, where I do bigger things from here. Things are going well for me here, but in Spain at first it was like “oops, what a name, that sounds weird”. And when they contact you about an important or famous festival like Coachella, suddenly the headline appears: “From Vallecas to Coachella.” And now, right? It’s as if they’re calling you from somewhere else, from somewhere as important as the U.S. People here aren’t paying attention.

In the United States, he enjoys a beautiful linguistic relationship with the children and grandchildren of Spanish-speaking immigrants, who almost no longer speak Spanish but understand his words and follow his music with genuine enthusiasm.

Yes, because many of them feel abandoned, lost. They are not Americans, some of them are new arrivals without citizenship, but they are not Mexicans either, because Mexico does not consider them Mexicans. They live complex realities. And now even more so. The last time I was there, ICE was already there, and there were people telling me online that they wanted to see me play, but didn’t want to risk it. Very fucked. Promoters also say that it is very noticeable that fewer people are watching the performances of Spanish or Latin American artists.

If America continues to grow more than Spain, would you consider moving there?

I don’t know, maybe a little temperature. But I love living here, I love being close to my family, my friends, my things, my gastronomy, the climate and my cultural context. It is very fashionable to leave your country and experience many things, but we have to appreciate what we have. Sometimes life knocks you out, but now it’s more fashionable to get out there.

His collaborative music album with Bb Trickz attracted a lot of attention, as expected. Did they know each other?

No, but they were big fans of my movement and told me they wanted to do something with me. At first I was very skeptical about the whole thing. But deep down I find it funny, I’ve always found Bb Trickz very funny. I went in without knowing what was going to happen, and when we finished I had a feeling that it was amazing. It was real because they loved Sonora’s depression, they understood it and wanted to do something with it. The Sonoran Depression came across as very naive, very interesting, and very silly. It’s so nice to hear in the background. It’s very funny to me.

Since she had a strong desire for the image, it seemed very pioneering to me to post the videos with a black background, without further ado. It’s as if he’s saying: “If you like this, just let it be for the music.”

The idea was mine. It was very natural. At first the idea was to write a song, but since we were having fun we said, “Come on, let’s go for an EP.” But I wanted it to be something really stupid, just something, and we got together and this came out, just like this. That’s why the black image appears on the cover as well. There’s a song on the EP that says “Everything doesn’t matter,” because everything doesn’t matter. What does it matter, if people don’t understand why we’re coming together…

What attracted you to Bb Trickz? Because his flow is average to put it mildly and it is clear that his greatest talent is molly. Like Sid Vicious in the Sex Pistols, who had no idea how to play, but was cool.

Of course, it’s exactly the same thing. Just like he provoked Sid Vicious, when he went out there wearing a t-shirt with a swastika on it and made everyone jump on her, because this girl has this ridiculous, ridiculous thing with money and whatnot to provoke. This makes me laugh.