{"id":12600,"date":"2022-12-07T00:00:57","date_gmt":"2022-12-07T05:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/?p=12600"},"modified":"2022-12-06T14:07:32","modified_gmt":"2022-12-06T19:07:32","slug":"ciudad-metal-un-festival-on-repeat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/ciudad-metal-un-festival-on-repeat\/","title":{"rendered":"Metal City: an \"on repeat\" festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is a lot of myth and romanticism surrounding the Metal City festival. The weather conspires to turn Santa Clara into a big fishbowl, humid and cold, during the days of the event, which has become a local tradition. Since its second edition in 1999, the rock festival of the Hermanos Sa\u00edz Association of Villa Clara, considered the most important of its kind in the country, has been held every year without interruption, summoning musicians, promoters and devotees of national rock.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some come for the music, others for the reunion with old friends. Among the heterogeneous crowd, the punk and metal imagery stands out; an amalgam of multicolored crests, piercings, military boots, tattoos and <\/span>t-shirts<\/span><\/i> rockers. There is no lack of alcohol \"pometas\" in the atmosphere, nor cigarette smoke, nor the usual \"slams\" (a pilong name for the \"slams\"). <\/span>mosh<\/span><\/i>), nor the occasional annoyance. There are also those who, appealing to nostalgia, complain about the current state of the festival when, in reality and despite the attempts of its organizers to breathe new life into it, each Metal City seems a repetition of the previous one.<\/span><\/p>\n

Complemented with presentations and collateral events in El Mejunje, the XXV edition of the festival had the El Bosque recreational center as the main stage for the evening concerts (highlights of the event), unlike previous years where, in most cases, the Sandino market square fulfilled that function. The selection of El Bosque responds to the interest of the AHS to make the event self-sustainable, according to C\u00e9sar Irigollen Mili\u00e1n, vice-president of the association in Villa Clara. In spite of the free admission of other editions, 20 pesos to access the venue does not raise anyone's eyebrows either.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"XXV

XXV edition of the Metal City festival. Photo: Gabriel Herrera L\u00f3pez.<\/p><\/div>\n

However, good intentions are not enough and, although choosing a new venue could have been a \"refreshing\" decision, the reality was different. During the last day, with renowned groups such as Switch, the patio of El Bosque barely housed more than 300 attendees, less than its total capacity. And although the space had gastronomic offers, the bar only sold mineral water and rum strikes (Decano?) for 15 pesos, which were soon sold out.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

From the infrastructure point of view, the presentations were marked by precariousness. In addition to the constant audio problems and rain delays, there was no lighting treatment at all. The use of spotlights directly over the musicians gave too much sobriety to the shows and, although the stage has the possibility to do so, the use of projections or other scenographic resources was not chosen either.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Even though the experience of bands like Blinder, Scythe, Switch or Bouquet enriched the lineup, the event had the grateful representation of young groups like By Titan's Decree, Sue\u00f1an los Androides, Fire Rain, Ufory or Rising Ravens. However, the very conception of the festival was against the inclusion of more new artists.<\/span><\/p>\n

While the original mission <\/span>\u2014<\/span>according to the organizers of the event<\/span>\u2014<\/span> is the promotion of national exponents of rock, with all its subgenres and with emphasis on young creators, those who make up the lineup each year generally pay tribute to metal and, to a lesser extent, to genres such as punk or alternative rock. Thus, in my opinion, Ciudad Metal suffers from an identity crisis. In practice, it encompasses the rock universe, but with a special treatment towards a specific style, perpetuating the erroneous clich\u00e9 of \"rock equals metal\".<\/span><\/p>\n

If this festival focuses on the most extreme genres, it should rethink itself as an exclusive event for this purpose and avoid giving non-preferential positions to groups that, in any other context, would deserve to be headliners. The condition of being an event dedicated to the entire rock spectrum only on paper, its tendency to reiterate artists and its own limitations for food, transportation and lodging of the bands, cause the disconnection of the event with some of the most interesting proposals of the national scene: Orphan Autopsy, Tape, Land Whales, Eskortey, Katarziz, Shogun, Lawton Zombies, Thorn Tide.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Rising

Rising Ravens at Metal City. Photo: Gabriel Herrera L\u00f3pez.<\/p><\/div>\n

The remarkable indifference of the public to some of the invited groups points to the poor dissemination work of the artists about their own works. The rule is to find at each festival bands with no recorded material to refer to, or artists who have not released new productions for several years. And we question again the criteria used to select the bands to be part of the <\/span>line up<\/span><\/i> or whether the organizing committee takes into account, perhaps, the preferences of the public.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This event deserves an update in its management methods and, to do so, it could learn from the experiences of other music festivals such as Cuerdas de Acero in Havana or the local Longina. The sale of merchandising, public feedback through social networks or a reconsideration of its technical requirements could positively and drastically influence the quality of Ciudad Metal.<\/span><\/p>\n

After two editions <\/span>on-line<\/span><\/i>The \"return to normality\" of this XXV edition shows the improbable health of the Cuban metal and rock scene. Despite these not few inadequacies, the festival reappears every year, preserving its particular aura and the complicity of a public that tirelessly defends it. Even so, its ability to persist over time anchors it, through conformity, to a mythical version of what it was.<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After two online editions, the \"return to normality\" of this XXV edition shows the improbable health of the Cuban metal and rock scene. Despite these not few inadequacies, the festival reappears every year, preserving its particular aura and the complicity of a public that tirelessly defends it. Even so, its ability to persist over time anchors it, through conformity, to a mythical version of what it was.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1584,"featured_media":12601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[25],"tags":[7925,4982,5595],"coauthors":[9379],"class_list":["post-12600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-resenas","tag-festival-ciudad-metal","tag-rock-cubano","tag-santa-clara"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/magazineampm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/ciudad_metal_web_OK_baja-scaled.jpg?fit=1200%2C548&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1584"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12600"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12605,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12600\/revisions\/12605"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12600"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazineampm.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}