Metro de Madrid

For 90 years now, Metro de Madrid has been part of the lives of millions of Madrileños, so it should come as no surprise that this mode of transport has been both a source of inspiration for dozens of musicals and the stage – often improvised – for many musicians.

Thanks to the scholar of the zarzuela (traditional Spanish operetta), José Prieto Marugán, we know that the first reference to the Madrid underground in this musical genre occurred just a few years after its inauguration with the 1928 premiere of “La chula de Pontevedra”, a two-act farce written by Enrique Paradas and Joaquín Jiménez. In that work, the lead character, Rosiña, who lives in Cuatro Caminos, site of the first line of the Madrid Metro, proudly remarks that they have a “great underground” there.

Four years later, in 1932, with the premiere of “El aguaducho”, one of the characters, Cayetana, complains that they took away her beverage stand in the Plaza del Progreso (today Tirso de Molina) “to put in the Metro”. Right after that, the very conservative Cayetana confesses that she has not yet ridden in the underground: “If anyone had ever told my grandmother we’d be riding around underground someday, she never would have believed it!”

Over the next decades there would continue to be occasional references to the Metro in songs, such as the one by the Austrian-Spanish Franz Johan (“Qué barbaridad”, 1946), but it would not be until the arrival of democracy and the emergence of rock music in general and Madrid’s urban rock and movida in particular, that the references to the Madrid underground, such an essential element in the lives of youth then and now, would abound:

-Kaka de Luxe, the predecessor of groups such as Alaska and los Pegamoides or La Mode, gave us the ironic “Viva el Metro” (1978), a song filled with sarcasm in which they complained about a recent rate increase.

- Madrid’s leading urban rock group, Leño, one of whose members was Rosendo, was formed in Carabanchel around the same time as Kaka de Luxe. The cover of their first single, “Este Madrid” (1978), showed the members of the group coming out of the Metro.

- Topo, the group from Vallecas, adopted the Metro rhombus as their logotype with their name printed inside. That logo would be prominently displayed on their first album cover in 1979. One of the songs on their third album was titled “Reina del vagón” about a beauty who illuminates the “the eternal night of the Metro”.

- One of the biggest hits of the pop group Trastos, whose first and only album was released in 1980, was “El loco de la línea 5” about an eccentric character who “gets on in Aluche and goes to Ciudad Lineal”.

-This repertoire would not be complete without Joaquín Sabina, one of the leading musical chroniclers of Madrid for the last 30 years. While Trastos sang about Line 5, Sabina enumerated four stations on Line 1 in his “Caballo de cartón” (1984): “Tirso de Molina, Sol, Gran Vía, Tribunal, where your office is so I can pick you up”. Later, the singer-songwriter from Jaén would comment on those verses about the Madrid underground: “When I recorded the song the Metro station was called José Antonio. By the time it was released the station was called Gran Vía. My song was ahead of its time by a few months, without even knowing it.”

-In the 21st century, Manu Chao brought the Metro de Madrid public address system to the entire world in his album Próxima estación: Esperanza, in which the announcement for the Line 4 station can be heard.

An exceptional stage

Prestigious musicians including Javier Álvarez have recognised that they took their first musical steps in the form of improvised performances in the Metro’s corridors. Others, however, have had the privilege of performing live with their entire bands, thanks to Metro de Madrid’s active interest in bringing music to the public in the early years of the new century, converting its facilities into stages for live music performances, from pop to flamenco to opera. National artists in all genres have performed at the Chamartín, Principe Pío, Nuevos Ministerios and Mar de Cristal stations. The list is long, but some of the most notable artists include Diego El Cigala and Miguel Poveda (as part of Metro’s Flemenca Summit), Luz Casal, Concha Buika, Rosario Flores and Sole Giménez (at the Metro’s Creators Festival), Raphael and the dancer Antonio Canales, who performed his Torero at the Avenida de la Ilustración station. There have also been photographic exhibits focusing on rock culture or schools of dance as part of the competition titled Flamenco pa tos, promoted by Gomaespuma.

In conclusion, a question: What do El Canto del Loco and The Libertines, the first group which counted the controversial Pete Doherty among its members, have in common? Both bands have recorded video clips in the Metro. The Madrid band recorded “Eres tonto” in 2008 in one of the Light Rail’s modern train cars while the English group recorded the video “Time for Heroes” in 2003 in various downtown stations. Apparently, though, the British group did it without permission.