First they became friends, then they created a music group. Snake began rehearsing in 2015, and after several changes, the three members of the band recorded a EP of five songs two years later: Ana Arsuaga on the micro and keyboard, Beatriz perales on the bass and Elena Núñez on the battery. Perales and Núñez played earlier in the Octopussys group, while Arsuaga, who had studied piano and singing, had not formed a group yet. They recorded simple songs of elemental instrumentation, which led the listener into dark environments on bass repetitive lines, under the cover of a sweet voice. In his first feature film, Krisanteilu (International Smoke, 2019), which has just been published, the memory is also transferred to the post-punk of the 80s, but it is evident that the songs do not want to stay there and that they escape any attempt at freezing anywhere, suggesting that this attitude is the only one that is worth for a decent artistic search.

Criticism has sometimes confused the simplicity of songs with amateurism, but that is not very much in favor of the members of the group. “Why do they call us amateur? Because amateurism still blends with the lack of virtuosity,” says Arsuaga. She also points out that being a woman has a lot to do with the ease with which these labels are placed. “We had to read everything. Once again, a chronicler baptized us as “the pups” (the girls), just as we touched a group younger than us. They were kids, of course.” Simplicity is not a consequence of the impotence you want to do for the Snakes. “That’s what we seek. The process of creating songs is also like this: we try to get them to the fullest with very little, to do something of quality with four things. This philosophy can be seen at the end of the songs.”

As you remember, with the union of the current trio, they began to find that sound of their own. An important feature in this search was the way Núñez played the battery: unlike the previous batteries in the group, he decided to play standing, without bombs, with a few boxes and a few drums. “A friend recommended it to me. When I started playing in the group, I realized that the sound had a soft, soft, sweet tone, and that the battery could annoy it. I started testing, and I think I've found the right measure." When you create the songs, most of the time they start off from the bass riff, and at this rate they start to improvise. Asked whether the fact that up to three people come from the world influences the creative process, Arsuaga said yes: “We feel a link. When we create a new idea, we act very free, fearlessly. Someone who has studied music in a regulated way often finds it difficult to have a vision beyond maintaining the right technique. First, it has to give the level. However, we do not have that much pressure, and that makes us more courageous when we create.”

Beyond Collage

If you don't fit on the labels, it's not because you've been looking for that. “We started playing and that’s what came out, there’s nothing premeditated.” If someone asks you what you're touching, you've got the answer ready. “Listen to the album and you will see it.” “But listen to the whole album!” they add laughing. They look for novelty in composing. They feel comfortable looking for languages never worked and creating fragments of songs from them. The hardest step is to find consistency, to get the loose fragments of songs not to remain in a collage. “What costs us the most is to make transitions between each other so that at the end the song has a whole. However, the whole process is very natural. And once the bases are defined, we introduce the voices.” Arsuaga writes the lyrics, both in Basque and Spanish, but the paper is always adapted to what the song suggests. “Depending on what I do with the voice, or what the base transmits to me, I change what I have already written, or directly I do other words. For me, melody is more important than words, so I always mold words to melody.”

Although in the first EP and the new album there is a similar aesthetic wager, a leap is noted. “The new album is more complex than the previous one. Not only because we now play better, but because we have evolved musically.” Núñez recalls that in the previous work he did play, but did not participate in the process of creating songs. On the new album, however, it has been very important for him to participate since the beginning of his career. And hard too. “I’ve suffered a lot from recording the battery. When recording everything has to be clear, I have my own way of playing, and it's taken me a long time. I recorded it all in one day, but what day… I even cried.” In the recording of the previous EP all played together in the study, as if it were direct, and it made them easier. Now, however, the individual recording of the tracks required more precision. In addition, in post-production they wanted to make as few traps as possible. “We preferred to continue until we were able to record a good essay, then we are very grateful for the result. But we’ve had to have some hard times for it.”

Friendly scene

The album has been recorded in Subiza, in the Montreal studies, with the collaboration of Urtzi Iza and Hans Kruger. The Asturian label International Smoke has been in charge of publishing the work of Garzón. “We played some concerts in the Galician area, and in one of them we met Pablo Fernández, the creator of the record label. He proposed to take out the new work with them, and because we really like the groups he produces, we don’t think twice.” In the recording process not everything has been suffering, they have also experienced good moments. “With the theme of sound, for example, we have learned a lot. We've never been sound geeks, and it's amazing to know what the world is there. We have flipted.” They also enjoyed the cooperation of Andoni de la Cruz from the Vulk group throughout the process. “In Bilbao there is a friendly scene. In addition to those of Vulk, Lukiek, Karpatos… we may not have much to do with music, but we feel them very close.” As for the sound, they find more connection with the bets they drink from experimentation or that tend to more atonal lines. The figures quoted by the National Audience include Akauzazte, Ibon RG and Sacco, among others. “But they’re all bigger than us and we’ve barely shared the stage with them.”

Now you're looking forward to returning to the concerts. In the audience, they're interested in what happens at the moment when they're on par with the public. They say it's one of the moments that they enjoy most as musicians. “In the direct ones you see more clearly than in any other place the enormous power that music has to influence others. One starts dancing, the other gets excited… it is very strong what happens there with the listener. It's a kind of communication that reaches a dimension where the word can't reach. There is no more powerful channel than music to quickly connect with the other.” They look for that sensation to every single person, even though they know that it's often hard to get. However, they also have surprises. “In the direct you give something and in return you get an answer. Literally. But there are other moments, like when we’re composing… Suddenly, an idea takes shape, we all realize it at the same time and we put the ass of the hen.”

On the 28th they will work at the bar El Muelle de Bilbao and in December within the ZaratFest schedule. Snake continues to slip in search of something that has not yet been found, and despite being immersed in the direct ones, they have already begun to compose new songs, “even to leave behind the old songs”.