The aging rockers of Cuba finally deserve their due

HAVANA: For decades, their songs have been banned and even called "the music of the enemy". But Cuban rockers have finally found their place in a country where salsa, rumba and reggaeton prevail.

This year, Havana will celebrate the International Day of Rock and Roll – to be held Saturday, July 13 – with three days of concerts.

Every day, 13 bands will perform at Maxim Rock, the club that also houses the government-sanctioned Cuban rock agency, for a 10-hour marathon.

We will be far from the many years when the clbadic rocker look – long hair, skinny jeans and leather bracelets – was in contradiction with the image of the "new man", hardworking and serious, praised by the authorities during the revolution from Fidel Castro.

Despite the obvious difficulties, most Cuban rockers have chosen to stay at home and devote themselves to their music, rather than opting for exile or dissident life struggles.

Nowadays, some have lost their hair while others can no longer sneak into these tight jeans, but they continue to give regular concerts in Havana.

Roberto Diaz, 48, with a grizzled goatee who will start a European tour next month with his group Animas Mundi, was one of the musicians who tried to keep rock in Cuba at the end of the 1980s.

"I was one of those young people who were being stopped all the time in the street, asked for my ID documents, or were driving me to the police station if I walked around with my guitar or keyboard," he said. Diaz.

"It was difficult – it was not like today," said Virgilio Torres, a 62-year-old singer from Vieja Escuela ("Old School").

IDEOLOGICAL CORRUPTION

Rock arrived in Cuba from the United States in 1955, four years before the revolution.

The political confrontation between the island nation under communist rule and Washington then followed – notably in the form of the US economic embargo in force since the early 1960s.

Rock music was banned from television and radio broadcasts from the 1960s to the 1980s, before slowly benefiting from a decade of growing tolerance.

During the ban, rock "has sometimes been considered ideological corruption," Torres said.

"It was the music of the enemy because we were singing in English, which created confusion.

"Later, the authorities realized that this was not the case, many years later, but they had already deprived many musical instruments of many musicians, leaving them nothing."

Island rockers had to find ingenious ways to keep playing.

"We made guitar strings with telephone wires, used telephone handsets to make adapted microphones, we created wooden speakers," said Aramis Hernandez, 62, a drummer and Challenger Group leader.

YELLOW SUBMARINE

In 1990, the Soviet Union collapsed, Cuba lost its main backer – and the island experienced its worst economic crisis.

At that time, rock music began to spread its wings.

The outdoor concert space "Patio de Maria" opened its doors in a highly symbolic place: near the Place de la Revolution, the political center of the country.

It is here that the first Cuban professional rock bands began to perform and that the change was in the air.

Castro himself unveiled a statue of John Lennon in 2000 and El Submarino Amarillo, a rock bar that pays tribute to the Beatles' album and eponymous film, "The Yellow Submarine", opened its doors.

Several state-run cultural centers have begun to include rock – once considered subversive – in their programs.

It was a step in the right direction, "but there is still much to be done," Hernandez said.

"Access to television and radio programs has improved, but we are only at the beginning."

Torres says that it is still difficult to arouse the interest of music labels.

Steinar Seland, a 50-year-old Norwegian who arrived in Cuba in the 1990s, is the leader of Vieja Escuela.

When he arrived on the island, rock "was still a marginal phenomenon, and it remains a bit like this," says Seland.

"But again, we are on the island of salsa, is not it?" he added.

Cuban Cubans say they are ready to make up for lost time.

"There are fans who have started coming back," said Torres, explaining the phenomenon of "tembas" (oldies), animated by nostalgia and the happiness of being able to listen openly.

"They were hippie and rock kids, and now they are architects, doctors … perfectly integrated into society."

Even though the audience is still relatively small, "it makes us happy" to play without fear, said Torres.