Julian Benjamin

Infobox musical artist
Name = Julian Benjamin

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Img_size= 200
Background= solo_singer
Years_active = 1982 – present
Origin = Buenos Aires, Argentina
Genre = Pop, Rock
Instrument = Piano, Guitar, Keyboards, Percussion, Jaw's harp
URL = [http://www.julianbenjamin.com.ar Julian Benjamin's Official Site] Julian Benjamin (Buenos Aires, Argentina, 3rd. February 1965) musician, pianist, keyboard player and singer-songwriter of German descent. Now lives in Spain.

Beginnings

Despite having played the piano and the keyboard most of the time, his first instrument was actually the guitar. When he was five, he met Javier Calamaro, whose brother, Andrés Calamaro, would encourage him to play the piano and compose his first songs. It was during those early years that he started to record regularly with an old Geloso tape recorder. That was also the period of the first groups and first concerts.

Instrucción Cívica

Julian Benjamin and Kevin Johansen met at primary school and soon would be united by their passion for music. Once they finished school they created a band called "Zaratustra" and were joined by the brothers Roberto and Daniel Krause. That same year, Julian met Fernando Samalea and invited him to take part to his experimental project, the "Agitese antes de usar jazz rock & pop experimental band". "Zaratustra" recorded two songs before the brothers Krause decided to abandon the project due to a problematic concert. Julian then invited Fernando Samalea to record new songs. Gustavo Donés would play bass guitar. After getting his contract to record his first disc Daniel Krause decided to join the group again and played bass guitar while the band would be completed with Fernando Samalea (drums, percussion and programming), Kevin Johansen (guitar and vocals) and Julian Benjamin (piano, keyboards and vocals). Alejandro Terán (clarinet) and Axel Krygier (flute) later joined the band. Instrucción Cívica recorded two albums and was part of the first Argentine bands from the 80s which went beyond their frontiers with their albums and huge concerts. The song "Obediencia debida" is still a reference from those years.

Los Perros

One friend invited Julian to a concert of "Los perros" where he met Gabriel Carámbula. Not long after, Julian joined the band and with Rinaldo Rafanelli as producer, they recorded their first album, where Julian was in charge of keyboards and percussion. From that moment on, he would participate to three of the four albums of the band. Due to the success of their third album "Perfume y dolor" with the hit song "Bajo la rambla" the band led a relentless activity, with three performances per night and a huge concert in the Estadio Obras Sanitarias. Los Perros then started tours through Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay to finally become the opening act of Guns N' Roses on the two concerts they gave in the Estadio River Plate in 1992. The following year Los Perros participated to the tour of Fito Paez, which culminated in two huge concerts in the stadium of Velez Sarsfield where about 90,000 people showed up.

Collaboration with other artists

Julian has collaborated on many albums playing instruments or writing songs. Among others: 

He played the piano and the organ, co-produced and co-wrote two songs of the album Verónica Verdier.
Piano and rhodes on the album "Falsas promesas tontas" by Proyecto Verona.
Piano on "Lejos" by La Chicana.
Piano on "Isso inclui você" on the album "Avalon" by Nei Van Soria.
He composed with Kevin Johansen "Chill out James" of the album "Sur o no sur"
.
He participated to the promotional show of the album "Frío" by Robi Draco Rosa in Buenos Aires.
He played the keyboards on "Dukakis", the project of the former member of "Los Rodriguez", Germán Vilella.
From 2006, he has participated to a variety of projects developed in Asturias (Spain).

Quemando las naves

A series of songs he composed as he was a keyboard player were the starting point of "Quemando las naves". Together with Diego Otaño and Marcelo Vaccaro they formed a band that was to be completed with Fernando Samalea (drums and percussion). The album was recorded analogically with a ‘raw’ sound, almost in live. It received very positive reviews from the Argentine press. Among the guests were: Facundo Guevara (percussion), Kevin Johansen (backing vocals), Norberto Minichilo (drums), Oscar Reyna (slide guitar) and Veronica Verdier (backing vocals). 


Track listing:

1. Quemando las naves
2. No te encuentro
3. Cargo tu cruz
4. Amor de gelatina
5. Alma desalumbrada
6. Megalomagnesio
7. Estemos juntos
8. Anestesia
9. Minisingle
10. Cadáver VIP
11. Clandestina
12. Jet de sangre

Liberación y dependencia

In Madrid Julian played on different projects while he was preparing "15 gramos de fama", the album he had started in Buenos Aires. A hand injury forced him to interrupt the recording. He took advantage of that time off to classify and listen to tapes that contained many years of home recording. He then came up with the idea of coming back to simple pop songs. Due to the style and quantity of songs he named the project "Trilogía de pequeños ensayos pop". Having rules out the idea of using part of those original recordings, Julian began to record the demos. Those recordings, which he continued to work on after having moved to Oviedo, became the starting point of "Liberación y dependencia", his first personal pop album. In Buenos Aires, the "Colo" Belmonte recorded the drums and percussion. He also counted on the participation of Kevin Johansen (guitar and charango – small five-stringed guitar), Axel Krygier (accordion) , Fernando Samalea (percussion) and Daniel Krause (bass guitar). The album was eventually completed in Asturias with the participation of Rodrigo Sturm (guitars) and Antón Ceballos (bass guitar) and, was mixed and masterized in Buenos Aires.

Track listing:

1. Otro adiós
2. Oh mujer
3. Fuego
4. Infelicidad
5. Por no llorar
6. Tus ojos
7. Eso mal llamado corazón
8. Lo que te queda
9. Liberación y dependencia
10. Libertad
11. Papá

Discography

Instrucción Cívica

• Obediencia debida
• Instrucción Cívica

Julian Benjamin

• Quemando las naves
• Liberación y Dependencia

External links

* [http://www.julianbenjamin.com.ar Julian Benjamin's Official Site]
* [http://www.myspace.com/julianbenjamin Julian Benjamin's Official MySpace]
* [http://www.zonadeobras.com/revistazdeo/revista40.asp Revista Zona de Obras - Nº 40: Viva La Canción]
* [http://www.lt24online.com.ar/2000news/0330e.htm FM88 Quemando las naves]
* [http://www.rock.com.ar/bios/0/147.shtml Rock.com.ar]
* [http://www.lahistoriadelrock.com.ar/ban/bani2.html La Historia del Rock Argentino]