Si todo Hiciera Crack: Behind the lines

Our first and only album, "Si todo Hiciera Crack" was recorded in the Audiofilm studios in Madrid at the end of April 1979.

The record company had assigned for this record a maximum of 5 days working days in the studio and it was during this time that all preparations plus the actual recording were done.

According to the album credits, Crack, the band itself, was responsible for the musical production. I don't know yet exactly why there was no one from outside the group participating in this crucial site of the production. But, just a guess, there was no money for it. Probably, Mariskal, the producer for most, if not all, the other groups recording for the Chapa lable, did not quite know how to handle properly the production of a group like Crack who did not fit at all into the pattern of all his other rock groups. Most probably he did not pay much listening to the group and in any case did not invest the required amount effort to "sell" this record.

For reasons yet unknow, Rafa, our guitarist, was not allowed to use of his own Marshall amplifier for the actual recording. Even today he complains abut this silly imposition. He had carefully worked for months on his own sounds for every part, and he knew how to get them out of his Marshall. But mysteriously in the last minute he was forced to use a Roland amp instead that he did not how to set properly. He did his best, but even now he regrets this strange imposition by the label.

Mento Hevia, our keyboardist had however a great and positive surprise when the studio allowed him to use their mellotron as he considered best. Mellotrons were a rarity at the time, and as Luis Fernández Soria, the studio recording and mixing engineer ..., that particular mellotron had hardly been used by anyone before us. Mento, enthralled with the promising possibilities of the instrument, saw here new ways to enlarge his composition ideas. While Luis Soria was recording the parts of the rest of us, Mento would spend his "free time" learning how to translate and apply some of the sounds he had been working with to his new mellotron friend. The result of his effort can be heard largely throughout the record.

Encarnación González, "Cani" who we had met a few month back.... was invited to take part in the recording. Somehow we knew her voice could perfectly fit in some parts, and we thought her singing could add an extra to our vocals. She accepted right away and came to Madrid for a couple of recording sessions. We had had no previous rehearsing with her so it was a question of finding the most suitable parts where she could enrich our tunes. Here again, while other instrument were being recorded we prepared together Cani's vocals. With her there was no need for retakes (as she was a great singer) and all her parts were recorded in a breeze.

After five days at the studio and a tree months of impatient waiting, which seemed like ages to us "Si todo Hiciera Crack" was finally released on July 23, 1979.

The budget for the promotion of "Si todo Hiciera Crack" was close to non-existent. The record company had decided to invest in some more risk-free types of music. The rule of thumb has been always of course that the less commercial the music, the less interesting. On the other hand the new wave movement known in Spain as "La Movida", for many reasons more commercial and a more of a sellable product was gaining momemtum leaving little and finally no space for traditional rock groups and more particularly for the few representative groups of Spain's progressive rock. Those were hard times for progrock considered locally also as a more foreign british-american type of music.

However a notable example of that minimal promotion designed for Crack was the shooting of a TV video for the Spanish television which later was included in the Popgrama program, a mythical series dedicated to the Spanish rock and pop scene. A curious anecdote about this playback video using the master-tape ready for "Descenso en el Maëlstrom" is that Pepe Gamero, reponsible for the sound and lights in our concerts, had to take the role of Rafa Martínez, our real guitarist who for reasons yet unknown did not show in time for the early shooting session on our last day at the studio. Pepe was not happy with the idea as he did not play the guitar at all and did not feel comfortable in that role. It was after the insistance of Mariscal, the "non-producer producer", who he accepted to timidly, back in the corner pretend that he was here our guitarist.

I say that Mariscal was the "non-producer producer" of the record because altough on paper he had that role, apart from the fact that he got us the contract with the lable (Chapa), he invited us once to a modest meal, and spend a few minutes at the studio to see how everything was going on, he did not actually involve himself in the project. The proof of his little involvement is that he does not appear in the album credits, where the production is credited to Crack.

There was no serious promotion by the record company. The first record of a progrock group cannot reach the general public or even the symphonic rock fans if there is no a decided promotion by the record company. This should include interviews in newspapers and magazines, programming of the reproduction in local and national radio stations, appearances in TV programs and so on. Like I said before, there were probably many reasons not to invest in a product that you should want to sell, but the true fact is that really the company did not give a damn about Crack. This attitude from the company contrasts however with the interest shown years later by record companies from Asian countries which in various occasions decided to invest into a progressive album recorded many years before as the list of different releases shows.

Some details about the record:

Descenso en el Maëlstrom, literally "Descent into the Maëlstrom" is based in the short story with the same name by E.A Poe about the near-death experience of a white-haired man and his odyssey to survive a shipwreck after his vessel is caught in a whirlpool in a vortex ( the great Maelstrom). When the record company listened to our original compositions they considered that some of them were too long, far beyond the standards for a rock and roll band, and we were asked to reduce their length. So finally decided to split our long "El Cid" into three different parts and adapt the new tracks so that they conformed each of them a new different story.

The first new track was this "Descenso en el Maëlstrom" which musically was at the same self-contained and consistent in its own structure and at the same time totally different from his twin brothers:"Marchando una del Cid" y "Epílogo".

This division of the very long "El Cid" into three tracks which at the beginning we thought would be a very difficult task finally proved to be much easier than we thought. The reason is that Crack's music, if you listen to it carefully, except maybe for "Epílogo", you will hardly find any choruses or repetitions. The musical structure is a continuous line, a growing flow of musical ideas, all interconnected, progressively leading the story from the very beginning towards the end. This type of composition, that we could call linear, makes easy to split long pieces into shorter ones. Of course, you still have to be sure where to "cut" to make the story complete and credible and this requires a bit of adapting beginnings and endings. Anyway finally it was not that difficult to give birth to our three new compositions and once done we all agreed that, after all, that requirement imposed by the company proved to be a pretty good idea. Finding names for the new track was easy and those names positively conditioned the arrangement of the new tracks.

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