It is a melancholic month, of many contrasts. It defines the atmosphere of the album well, especially the lyrics.

That black and white cover, with the names of the musicians printed… brings to mind classic jazz albums.

I wanted the piano to appear on the cover, because it’s the first time in my life that I’ve made an album with it. And on this album the band is fundamental.

He made three albums with Paco Loco, then another, the duet album, ‘Amigos de Guardia’ (2021), with Ricky Falkner, and in this one he surrounds himself with the members of Rufus T. Firefly and Reme. Should we look for energy and ideas in musicians from a younger generation?

One or more: Reme are twenty-somethings! Paco Loco is a rather raw producer, Falkner is more classic, and now, ‘Septiembre’ is a more detailed and precious album. I love to talk before recording an album, and with Rufus and Reme we share the musical sphere. ‘September’ has one foot in the present and another in the late 60s and early 70s, and Daniel (Ruiz) and Víctor (Cabezuelo) love that. We talk a lot about records, like, “Have you heard that Wings one?”

His first album made on the piano, he says. Have you been playing it recently?

I learned during the pandemic, almost from scratch. Well, it’s a lot to say that I learned it; It was on my own, like the guitar. As Paul McCartney told Rick Rubin in the documentary: “playing the piano is very simple, you put your fingers here and there…”. To build the songs you don’t need much more.

“We’re missing Bowie, we’re missing Lou Reed / We’re missing Petty, it doesn’t rain in April,” he sings in ‘Train to Mars’. Don’t we get too melancholy about these things?

The thing about “it’s the end of the world” is ironic, although it has a point of escapism: I wrote that song during a pandemic and there was that desire to fly and escape. He talks about the loss of musical references. Little by little they are falling. Fortunately, we still have Bob Dylan, Neil Young, the Rolling Stones, McCartney…

Artists he still goes to see whenever he can.

Dylan’s at the Liceu in 2018 was the best concert I have ever seen in my life. Magical. And I have seen McCartney, the Stones, and Elvis Costello, Paul Weller many times… I saw Tom Petty at what turned out to be his last concert, at the Hollywood Bowl, a week before he died.

Are Costello and Weller models of how to lead a long career in pop while maintaining restlessness?

That is my aspiration and what I think I am involved in. I have made 27 albums in 32 years. But in Spain that is more difficult than in the United Kingdom or France. It is not a country that takes too much care of its artists. In Spain, if you make an album that doesn’t contain a hit, they’ll bury you. But here there are more and more long-lived races in a state of grace: Bunbury, Iván Ferreiro, Coque Malla, Loquillo…

There is no music on television, nor is music radio what it used to be. What do you do now when you want to promote an album?

In the 80s and 90s, you could be promoting for two months and you would do twenty or thirty television shows, and in most of them you would sing, and many times live. With this album I’m not doing anything on television. The wonderful show hosted by Maika Makovski lasted two seasons. Ariel Rot’s is no longer there either. I think that television, at least public television, should have a music program.

Isn’t it seen in places like ‘El hormiguero’ or ‘La salud’?

First, I don’t see myself, and then it’s clear that they don’t want me, because they don’t call me. But I don’t see myself making jokes there. I’m probably not the target. I’m a pretty boring person.

Next year will mark 40 years since the formation of Duncan Dhu, and in 2025, the first album. Could there be a reunion with Diego Vasallo?

At least a dinner, right? There was a reunion tour ten years ago, the only one since we broke up in 2001. He’s releasing an album now, and we’ll both be very focused on our own thing next year. And in 2025… I haven’t talked about it with Diego, but it could happen, I’m not saying no.