PIÑATA

PIÑATA is an independent music promoter focused on discovering new musical talents while also celebrating timeless legends. Free from any kind of classification or prejudice, their goal is to offer quality, eclecticism, and excellence both in the music and the experience for their attendees. PIÑATA was founded in 2019 in Barcelona as a spin-off from the historic promoter Serious Fan Music, led by Julio Martí - a concert promoter, festival promoter, and artist agency with 40 years of experience in the music world and over 10.000 concerts held during this period.

via IG @sala_apolo

PIÑATA, part of Serious Fan Music, then launched a series of concerts at the Apolo and La Nau venues, blending different musical styles and audiences. In the landscape of music promotion, where breaking through can often feel like a Herculean task, PIÑATA has managed to carve out a distinctive niche. Featuring an impressive lineup of artists such as Alfa Mist, Dirty Loops, and GoGo Penguin, PIÑATA has emerged as a space where innovative sounds and diverse musical explorations are celebrated. This October, PIÑATA continues to push boundaries by hosting Willie Peyote, one of Italy's most beautiful “pens.” Following the release of his latest album, which blends jazz influences (with a pop sensibility), Peyote will be a standout feature of PIÑATA's lineup, doing shows in Madrid and Barcelona. This collaboration underscores PIÑATA’s dedication to not only featuring cutting-edge talents but also creating significant cultural exchanges.

We had a chat with Carlos Martinez Borrell, artistic director of PIÑATA, to learn more about this amazing reality.

“Basically, everything happened in 2018. I've been together with music since I was 12 or 13 years, and I’ve always loved music, in fact, I've been always working in the music industry. I worked for ticketing companies, so I was also into the technological side of the music business, beside the marketing, communication, and stuff - so I’ve always been into this kind of world, you know. I’m from Valencia but I moved to Barcelona and I met a guy in Madrid that was kind of the same as me: really passionate about music, he also had a background in this kind of music-related businesses but he had never really been a promoter. We were going out to get some beers and we were like ‘Okay, let’s try to do something by ourselves. Let's try to find an artist that we like, and then let's try to make some shows in Madrid, in Barcelona’ - because my friend was, at that time, living in Madrid - and I was in Barcelona. So, it was the perfect connection to have, you know, things going on at the same time. We also were, in terms of taste in music, really similar. We had a lot of connections with people into rock, pop, electronic, and flamenco music promotion - but we wanted to bring something different because we thought that people would have loved to listen to different kinds of music, not only one thing. So we said ‘Okay, let's try to do something like that’. We looked for an eclectic artist and found Marc Rebillet, who was based in Canada. He’s gotten really famous, has also played at Coachella but at that time he wasn’t. He got famous on YouTube because he sings and plays loops with a looping station, so we booked him. The cachet was very low so we said ‘Okay, let's see if we can sell some tickets’, so we tried. And the funny thing, the cool thing, was that we sold out the show in three or four days. It was crazy, people loved it. And we said ‘Oh, f*ck, we can do it!’, so that’s where everything started. At that time, we were willing to bring the jazz scene like Alfa Mist, Yussef Dayes, and so on. There was no promoter doing this kind of music in Spain, and we were younger and in love with this scene so, since no one was really giving the fair attention to these people, we tried to book them. And we managed to do that, we brought Alfa Mist for the first time, Yussef Dayes for the first time. And the concerts got really big - people bought tickets and we had sold-out venues even if we weren’t doing a lot of promotion or anything like that. We were just booking the right artists. Later on, some big promoters in Spain started to contact us to get to know more about us and so we started to build something - which actually was called the Piñata Festival. So, the idea behind Piñata was to do around ten shows, in different venues in Barcelona: Sala Apollo, La Nau. And then, we had everything built: really eclectic shows, pretty cool lineups. And then, the COVID came and we stopped everything. Two years not working - everything was pretty messed for the whole music industry. When the pandemic ended, when everything reopened, we started to put a lot of shows out there, because we had a lot of time to think about the shows. In Barcelona it's difficult to find yourself a place to be a promoter - because there’s always like a big fight between promoters. But we found a gap into this business in which to insert ourselves because we decided to move more into the world of jazz, but with more open sides of it, you know? So, now, I would say Piñata is like a promoter around the world of jazz, you know? So, more or less, this is our story”.

PIÑATA acts as a bridge between artists and venues, bringing together diverse talents and offering them a platform to express themselves. It’s not just a simple series of events, but a living, breathing entity in constant evolution, always eager to expand itself.

“This year, the Barcelona Jazz Music Festival contacted us to do some co-promotion together. We are doing around 10 shows together with them, and this also helps us to build more and more the brand identity. Jazz music festivals are always really involved with the series and it’s really cool to be part of this movement reaching out to an older audience. The main reason they wanted to work with us is that we build a professional connection with artists. We always speak directly with the agencies and this makes us not only have a really good connection with the artists but also good deals because you are not paying more people - you go straight away. We actually ‘own’ the artists in Spain. So, what we are trying to do is to do business with people but including our artists. PIÑATA is both in the middle and the face. So, you're always going to see like ‘PIÑATA and Barcelona Jazz Music Festival’. For instance, the Barcelona Jazz Music Festival is doing Gogo Penguins, and it’s a band that we promote. So, I'm the one that books the artist, but we promote it together - this is the way we are building it. I also have my own artists, because some of them do not match the taste profile of the Festival, so I can have my own thing to do with PIÑATA, like with Willie Peyote. I'm going to be the booker of Willie Peyote in Spain. So, if any festival wants to book Willie Peyote, they have to contact me. So, yeah, we are also moving in this direction”.

The project itself is moving towards another direction, becoming a vibrant space for connecting artists and venues, offering a platform for diverse creative voices to come together. So, when it comes to the booking process, PIÑATA starts from the artistic director’s personal tastes and knowledge.

“Well, first of all I like to book niche artists but you have to make sure that there’s an audience that actually likes the artist you want to book. To find new artists I usually do a lot of research in different kinds of ways. I listen to records but obviously, you cannot listen to 5,000 records a day. But you can choose an Instagram account, a YouTuber, someone with a nice taste, a friend that is really cool and has a little bit of different taste than you, but you know he has a good taste. You have to surround yourself with interesting people or interesting inputs that feed you with good quality of music. So, this is the first step and I try to do this all the time. The second step is to find if booking the chosen artist is going to make some kind of sense. Because sometimes it's a good artist but no one really listens to him in Spain. So us, as bookers, use three or four tools that provide us information about the chosen artist: audience, upcoming music, etc. The last step is just.. booking, contacting the artist, the manager. So, at the end, it's easy. The last step is contacting agencies, or sending DMs to the bands, managers, whoever. I try to be as straightforward as possible so I usually write an email trying to explain to the person in charge who we are, what we are doing, why do we want to book that artist, etc. Sometimes the feedback is fantastic, sometimes people don't even respond. Balance. In the case of Willie Peyote, it was easy for me, and I was really interested in his music. I was in love with a band from Napoli, Nu Genea - I promote their shows in Spain. We were friends and went out a lot. Their manager is a guy called Orlando and when I found out about Willie’s music, I called him saying ‘Hey man, you are Italian and surely know this guy’. He replied saying ‘Yeah, for sure, I know him’ and he gave me an email to which to send the request to. After a few weeks, we had the contact with manager and the artist and we booked the shows. Also, it happens that once you start to have a lot of shows, you gain the attention of the international bookers and everything turns all the way round. Bookers start to sell you artists and promoting them and this is also cool, because you can actually get to know more music, also just by speaking with bookers”.

PIÑATA is committed to creating a community, beyond just hosting concerts. The manifesto is to foster connections between people in the cities where it operates, building something rich in culture and human connections. To this end, PIÑATA plans to incorporate various collateral activities throughout the year. These include organizing vinyl and DJ sets at bars or record shops, and other events that enhance the local cultural scene. This approach not only supports emerging artists but also strengthens the bonds within each city, making PIÑATA a huge part of the Spanish cultural landscape.

“The PIÑATA season starts by the end of September and expands in October, November, December. Normally, what we do in September is coming to the hi-fi bars and have some nights with local DJs - and then presenting the shows that we have on the lineup. We usually also organize activities that grant you three or four tickets to our shows, we try to involve people. There is a core of people that follows you in anything you do, because they just like it. And it's not only about music. It's also because they like to meet other people with the same music taste. So at the end, it's like a small community, and what I try to do as much as possible is try to involve and support those people that support the brand and the shows at any moment. Sometimes some people don't even know the artist, but they come to our shows, and that’s really cool. So I try to make it easier for them - it comes quite natural. If you see a familiar face for 10 shows, and you see that familiar face coming also to the collateral activities, it comes natural to tell them ‘Hey, here are four or five tickets for the shows for the rest of the year’. When I started to build this project I wanted to do it not only music related. But with the time I realized that people are so busy and there is so much going on - so, at the end, you cannot complicate things, you have to be a music promoter. You promise to your fans or to your community that you are going to put out good shows, everything is going to be fair, price is going to be fair, and the experience is going to be good. Also, I always try to have after shows with the artist, to enhance this sense of community and connection. When the show is finished, I always say to the artist ‘Let's go out and have some drinks with the people’, and it happened a lot - we heard a lot of crazy stories. I always miss that part of the music, this is why I try to bring it up to my shows. I love electronic music and when I was going out (I lived in Berlin for a while and I always experienced electronic music) I had a lot of this kind of connections. For instance, you are in the club and you meet the DJ in the back smoking and you just start speaking with him, and some kind of connection starts to get built. This rarely happens with jazz or rock music - it’s more like you are on this side because you buy a ticket and then you are on this side because you play the music. With PIÑATA, one of the ideas was to make a mix. Not in the back smoking cigs, but after the shows. I can do this also because I would say that 95% of the people that come to our shows are quite interesting people because the music we promote is quite interesting. I know for sure that my kind of audience would rather go for 10 minutes Q&A with the artist rather than going crazy and asking for pictures. We don’t see the person that comes to PIÑATA as a consumer but we see her as a human, a person to interact with rather than someone that just pays the tickets. I think people make the magic happen. I’ve been working with massive festivals and I don’t like the experience because you know boundaries are strict, everything is not humanized. it’s not cool for me so I’d rather stay on that side of the thing rather than to do a 10,000 festival. I love to keep it simple”.

But why PIÑATA?

“There is an album from Madlib called PIÑATA. When they released the album, I saw the name of the album and I was like ‘What, why piñata?’. It sounded (and sounds) really powerful, I liked it - it took my attention. So basically, I started to think about that and I thought that piñata is cool because there is always something good in a piñata. You don't know what. But you hit it and you’re sure that there’s something cool in it: sweets, presents - you know it's going to be positive for you, but you don't know what's inside. So the message behind it was really interesting for me, because at the end I wanted people to feel our concerts and our experiences like this. Like ‘Okay, PIÑATA puts out a show of a guy from Jamaica that nobody knows, but I know that's going to be good, so I want to go there’. This was the main idea: you don't know what to expect, but you already know it's something that will leave you something inside that's really beautiful and enriching and powerful. And I know for sure that sometimes this really happens because people told me. They knew like three or four artists from the lineup, but they didn’t know the rest. But they felt that they could have been good so they came anyways and that is when the piñata thing happens. Experiences like these are the best ones, because you are going to see something that you could like or hate - but in the end you are going to have a cool experience anyways. Everyone goes to known bands live music shows but I think that everyone should, at some point, go to unknown bands live music shows. The experience is more raw. I actually love to discover music like this because you know nothing and you discover something. A live music show is unique - it’s not like the cinema. It's something interactive. Cinema is beautiful, but it’s recorded so everyone sees the same and it’s always the same. It's not the same experience as a live music show. There’s always something crazy that could happen, it’s something magic. Also, because you get to know people that are over there with the same intentions as you. So, you just click with people. Things that, for example, at the cinema you cannot do. But you just click with people and it's enriching because, for instance, you can exchange musical tastes but you find yourself speaking of other 1,000 things. So, it's an exchange between people also and that can never repeat. You feel part of something. The music, the people that bring the instruments, the people that open the venue, there are so many things going on to make this happen. And it's really magical, you know? I think music should be more evaluated because it's really special. I tell you. This is my feeling”.

The music industry is complex, and managing a project within it could be challenging, requiring not only a deep understanding of the industry's dynamics but also the ability to navigate into it. Over time, a lot of difficulties have arisen, including a pandemic that made the music stop. Live performances were postponed or canceled, tours were disrupted, and many artists and industry professionals faced unprecedented financial and emotional strain.

“The main challenge we faced is the COVID pandemic. It was not possible to work, nobody in the world has lived an experience like this. It was a global thing, for sure, but it was just insane. To be honest, despite COVID, things have been going quite well. The only thing that feels disappointing is when we work with an artist and put our energies to build a relationship with him, and this artist decides to leave us to go with another promoter because they have paid more. This makes me feel sad, you know. It’s an ethical matter, it’s unfair, it’s almost like the initial connection with the artist was fake and just based on money. It's really crazy, but I tell you, it's true. This does not refer to everyone, because in this industry I also met a lot of nice people with really high values, and that's perfect. But other people, they are just cowboys. So when this happens to me is when I get really down. But the rest is quite fine and I think it’s because I don’t do crazy business. I just do the things that I like, for my health and my life in general”.

PIÑATA holds a significant place in the Spanish cultural scene. It has established itself as a key player and is now expanding its influence beyond national borders. Future, dreams, and big things coming up next.

“I think it would be really interesting to expand in other cities. We would like to move to Valencia, because I live in Valencia now and I want to promote something where I live. Also, Valencia is growing a lot - it’s a good place to start a business. Barcelona is the top city in Spain to be a promoter and Madrid is really, really powerful, but more like national music, I would say. So being us already established there, we are trying to expand to Valencia, involving local talents and pairing them with international ones. I also like the north of Spain, and I would like to reach Malaga. I mean, I don't want to go crazy, but I want to try to open. And I think that's also interesting for my relation with the artists because now I can book an artist for two cities, which are Barcelona and Madrid. But in 12 months or in 24 months, I can book an artist for four cities in Spain. So I would say, that’s step number one. Dreams and plans - I love Latin American music, especially Brazilian or Colombian music. I like to go there a lot and I would like to go more and more to create some kind of connection between Latin America and Spain. What I want to do is to try to find new talents in Latin America because I think there is a lot of things going on there. The music is being more Spanish than ever - if you see on the charts, a lot of Spanish music is on the high list worldwide, and that’s really interesting. I like that people get used to listening to Spanish people singing. And I think really there is really talented people out there. I was in Colombia a few months ago, I managed to get to know some nice people, nice talents. There are like a lot of things going on and it’s amazing. It's a new world. So I think these are the two ways I really want to expand this project towards, because I think that’s what makes the most sense. So expanding for shows to new cities in Spain and becoming more powerful as a booking agent, expanding my artists roster. That's actually the plan. I don't want to get crazy with anything - just keep doing what I'm doing”.