Mikel erentxun

Mikel Acosta Erentxun (Caracas, February 23, 1965) is a Spanish singer-songwriter born in Venezuela but settled in San Sebastián since his first year of life. He was the official vocalist and leader of Duncan Dhu and since 1992 he has performed solo under his own name.

Biography and career

Childhood

Mikel Erentxun was born on February 23, 1965 in Caracas, Venezuela. When his family returned to Spain, they settled in the San Sebastián neighborhood of Amara, San Sebastián, where he lived his entire childhood, adolescence and where he lives in the present.

Duncan Dhu

Mikel Erentxun is the vocalist of the group Duncan Dhu along with Diego Vasallo and Juan Ramón Viles, without the latter since 1989. They released 8 studio albums between 1985 and 2001, the year they said goodbye with the album Crepúsculo. Behind them they left songs that today are classics of pop and rock in Spanish, such as "Cien Gaviotas", "Somewhere", "Esos ojos negros", & #34;Garden of roses", "Between saltpeter and sweat", "Razando el eternidad" or "A street in Paris".

From 1992 to 2001, they combined the career of the band with their solo careers.

They are considered one of the most important band of the eighties.

They have made several compilations of their greatest hits, and they also made the tribute album Cien gaviotas, where will they go… a tribute to Duncan Dhu, in which Los Secretos, La Cabra, among others, collaborated Mechanics, Carlos Goñi, Amaia Montero, Leiva, Andrés Calamaro, Hombres G and Álex Ubago.

In 2013, Duncan Dhu returned to the scene with the studio album El duelo and the compilation album 1, touring Spain and abroad until 2015 when they once again leave the project on hold to continue their solo careers.

Solo Race

In parallel to the project with Duncan Dhu, without any pretensions, Erentxun began a solo career in 1992 with the album Shipwrecks, of which songs such as A un minuto de ti stand out. i>, Playing with time or This light will never turn off, Spanish version of the song There's a light that never goes out, of the British group The Smiths.

The great success of this album encourages him to continue publishing solo albums, combining it with his work at Duncan Dhu and his architecture studies.

He continued his solo career, publishing El abrazo del erizo (1995), Acrobats (1998) and Te dejas ver (2000).).

Once Duncan Dhu dissolved in 2001, he published Ciudades de paso (2003) and the compilation Éxitos (2004).

Musicians such as Mark Gardener, Robert Quine, Pete Thomas, Lloyd Cole, Mathew Sweet and Fred Maher have collaborated on his records. He also collaborated on the first album by the group La Oreja de Van Gogh, Dile al sol (1998), where he does the second choral voice on the songs Nightmare and What can I ask for, apart from appearing in the video clip El 28.

In October 2006 his seventh solo album came out, entitled El corredor de la suerte. On this album, he has, among others, the collaboration of Dani Martín (from the group El Canto del Loco) and the members of Amaral. With a sound more focused on folk and country rock and a little less on pop, without losing that unique sound of his songs. Songs like You Remember Me When It Was Me and Letters Of Love (When There Is No Love) stand out, becoming classics by the musician.

Erentxun played a small role in the short film Manhattan Pictures, shot in New York in November 2006. The short, in which the actors Kira Miró and Jorge Monje also take part, has the unpublished song Come to New York, composed expressly by Mikel for the occasion. [1]

In November 2007, on the Basque music radio Euskadi Gaztea compilation, Gaztea The Singles, he sang the classic song Lau teilatu ("Cuatro Tejados") of the former Itoiz group.

In June 2008 he published the live show Three Nights at the Victoria Eugenia with which he intends to close a stage, to start from scratch, a live album that offers the best of the three concerts he offered three nights in a row at the emblematic San Sebastian theater. In it, he has exceptional guests such as Iván Ferreiro, Leiva de Pereza, Rafael Berrio, Bunbury and Amaia Montero.

New stage

Mikel Erentxun, together with his group Las Malas Influencias, opens the third stage of his career with a new album: Detalle del miedo. The new work has been recorded and mixed in London in December 2009, on 16-track analogue tape, by Cameron Jenkins. Mikel Erentxun has done with "Detail of fear" a "tough record for tough times" in which he believes he has distanced himself enough from his previous works to achieve "something different", themes in which "sensations" have prevailed above all. & # 34; Perhaps the songs are not as round as before, when he squeezed them and removed everything that was left over to get to the essence. Now they have not gone through that purifying filter and have taken another type of atmosphere that he had not treated before. In this album the acoustic rock theme The last man in the world stands out. Another essential name in his new material is that of the lyricist Jesús María Cormán, with whom he forms a tandem that has worked for a long time as "a good couple". "Everything is discussed and everything is talked about before. He already knows how to think like I think and when I sing them I make the lyrics totally my own & # 34;, he adds.

In 2012 he released 24 Golpes, a 10-song album released on vinyl and CD. The album has been recorded at Waterfront Studios, in Hudson, New York (USA), by the hand of Henry Hirsch, a regular producer of Lenny Kravitz, Bobby Cole and Vanessa Paradis. Along with him is Eléctrica PKWY, with 10 songs featuring the collaboration of Rafael Berrio, JM Corman and Diego Vasallo. Eléctrica PKWY is recorded in the studio that Mikel has in his house (La Fábrica) and he plays all the instruments himself.

In 2015 he published "Corazones", produced by Paco Loco, which would be the first of a trilogy where, together with the Asturian producer, he would explore more psychedelic sounds.

In 2017 he released his album "El Hombre sin Sombra", with the Warner Music company.

In 2019 he released his album "El último vuelo del hombre bala".

In 2021 he publishes n#34;Amigos de Guardia#34; a double album where he reviews his 35-year career doing duets with colleagues like Quique González, Diego Vasallo or Amaral.

Television

In 2009 he participated in the television contest The Battle of the Choirs, in which he won with the San Sebastián choir.

Also that year, a total of 29 groups and independent artists prepared a tribute to him called Today, Tomorrow and Always, which could be downloaded for free on September 1. Among others, Squizo, Los Marcianos, Mercedes Ferrer, Turistas, Pablo G, Jean Paul, Marcelo Champanier, Atenas, El país musicano and Mikel Izal participated in it.

In February 2016, the program My way premiered in which Mikel Erentxun along with Nacho García Vega, Antonio Carmona, Manolo Tena, Sole Giménez, Marta Sánchez and David DeMaría share memories and cover versions the great successes of each of them living together in a house by the sea. The program, broadcast by La Sexta, is based on the international format "The best singers" Produced by Magnolia TV. The first chapter has been dedicated to the artist.

On January 8, 2022, Mikel was one of the singers participating in the solidarity concert Stronger than the volcano, which was organized by Radio Televisión Española in order to raise funds for the victims of the volcanic eruption of La Palma in 2021.

Personal life

He has been married twice, has five children: Aitor (1994), Claudia (2000), Siena (2007), Mael (2010) and Dakota (2013).

In 1998 he graduated as an architect, after a "long-distance career" of 14 years that he combined with his career as a musician.

In 2013 he suffered an episode of ischemic heart disease for which he had to be admitted and undergo surgery.

Discography

• Shipwrecks - 1992 (+260,000 copies)
• The hug of the hedgehog - 1995 (+80,000 copies)
• Acrobats - 1998 (+50,000 copies)
• 7 years (US only) - 2000
• You let yourself see - 2000 (+50,000 copies)
• Cities of passage - 2003
• Success - 2004
• The lucky runner - 2006
• Three nights in Victoria Eugenia - 2008
• Detail of fear - 2010 (Together to Bad Influences)
• 24 strokes + PKWY Electrical - 2012
• Hearts - 2015
• Wild heart EP - 2015
• The shadowless man (study album) + Live at the Roxy (direct) - 2017
• The last flight of the man bullet - 2019
• Friends of the Guard - 2021

Cinema

Occasionally, he has done small roles and cameos in some movies.

• Anonymous. - Alfonso Arandia, 1990
• Road and blanket - Alfonso Arandia, 2000
• Hotel Tívoli - Antón Reixa, 2007
• Manhattan Pictures - Israel L. Escudero, 2007