WL//WH Review: The new “Contra” LP by Catalan post-punkers PARANORMALES!!!

WL//WH Review Paranormales

Paranormales, Barcelona

On June 19, Cleopatra Records released the brand new ‘Contra’ LP by Catalan post-punk outfit Paranormales based in Barcelona. The band comprises of Ana Ruiz on vocals and keyboards, J.Carlos Delgado on bass, synthesizers and vocals, David Toro on guitar, and Diogo Santos on drums. The new ‘Contra’ LP is the band’s second full album following 2017’s ‘Belona’ debut and 2019’s peculiar ‘Juno’ EP of 4 remixes only by Wolfside, DJ Spada, Antoni Maiovvi, and NRZ. 2020 sees the Catalan outfit working with Italian producer Maurizio Baggio
(The Soft Moon, Boy Harsher, etc) who won the bet in making Paranormales sound more compact and with a real gold medal production all over.

These genuine and inspired bands like our guests today can reveal miracles when going to the studio with a sound engineer who really understands what he has in his hands and how it must finally sound. Here, the result is a brilliant album by both the band and the producer. Paranormales make post-punk music with an open mind to blend it with clear new wave, neo-romantic elements. Luckily for all (us, them, the label, the producer), they don’t fall into the trap of copying other successful norms from the genre, but as pure Barcelonians, they create new music as they find it in their dreams and in their jams. The band has glorious riffing ideas that quite often ending up to great songs with the overpowering advantage of Ana Ruiz; she is a skilled singer who has ‘studied’ plenty of rock vocal treatments, she has a warm voice by nature, and she is also a seemingly perfect narrator of the stories of the band. And here comes my problem, I do not speak Espagnol and I can only understand a few things from their titles and fewer more words in their songs…but who cares? I suppose we all like musings that are not sung in the languages we speak and that fact, besides being ‘exotic’ is also the sheer proof that music is an international dialect.

The album’s leading track is ‘Vertigo’ and it was unveiled earlier in March. Have a first taste and I’ll tell you more after this!

What a fantastic tune was that! Here is the new generation of the global post-punkers, greyish, and groovy in all! Paranormales hold a colourful sonic palette of all colors dark. Obviously this music is running through their veins as they are also aware of how to conduct it in clever and complete arrangements. ‘Harakiri’ is another glory for the band, a truly menacing groove, and quite deathrock oriented too, with the appropriate video by Zauber!

And ‘Gem’ is a gem indeed in the album. New-wavey in all its performance and sound this song will take you back to the origins of the genre, with fantastic melodies all over and a very spacious flow. As I was listening to this one, the darker shades of Mylène Farmer and the ‘Disintegration’ factor too came to my mind, what a song, listen!

I suggest you should at least listen to this album. ‘Contra’ LP doesn’t have to be kept as a hidden masterpiece or a record from way back in the year 2020 that everyone should pay attention to it. I told you my big thought before and I’ll note it again; here is the new post-punk scene! And here is the second album by this brilliant foursome from Barcelona!

Keep Up With Paranormales:

Paranormales, Barcelona

Written by Loud Cities’ MIke