Why devote a Saturday night in Montreal to Arca, the highlight of the Palomosa festival? Because Alejandra Ghersi Rodriguez had never been to Montreal before, and because this transgender artist is, in my opinion, the most significant game changer in electronic music on such a large scale. Since her emergence in 2012, when she joined Björk’s extended family and began her transition to non-binary, we’ve been swooning.
What we did on Saturday!
Kicking off with a resounding TABARNAK!, a swear word learned on the spot, Saturday’s performance was not a succinct summary of Arca’s work, but rather a major warrior use of her ammunition. That said, there were plenty of idiosyncratic sequences on offer to delight and contemplate the music of this gifted artist, served up by an exemplary sound system that highlighted the excellence of his mixes, imagined here and now.
Highly percussive, with a relentless succession of breakbeats and Afro-Latin polyrhythms including a burst of Brazilian samba, this 60-minute set was also interspersed with carefully selected pop references, vocal harangues, chanted words, and outright rap, also those climaxes punctuated by violent explosions, bursts of noise that normally have nothing to do with the accepted codes of pop culture.
Unlike most artists of similar renown, Arca does not construct his music around song-like forms (intro, chorus, bridge, chorus); melodic elements are scattered here and there, either as one element among others, without dominating the composition.
Although more accessible in front of an audience than in the studio, Arca does not subscribe to the codes of the dance floor either, excluding those covers topped with a return to big beat. Arca is more of a hybrid creature in every respect, making people dance a little but demanding attentive listening, which is not easy for the generation that has come to meet her. We are talking here about a true conceptual feat, nothing less.
The solo albums by the Venezuelan artist (who moved to Europe at the start of her career) have left a lasting impression, far beyond the circles of insiders who attend niche festivals such as Mutek and Akousma and who normally pushes back the mainstream press in its mainstream conservatism.
In fact, truly innovative creators who are capable of captivating mass audiences, who are normally fond of more conventional music and very difficult to win over, are very rare.
Electronic music is no exception to redundancy and predictability, but fortunately, there are times when someone like Arca emerges to captivate a wide audience while shaking things up. And, above all, elevating them with his innovative creativity.
