“From the moment a footballer steps onto the pitch, they are taking a gamble. They improvise just like a flamenco singer or a jazz musician improvises,” says Anton Alvarez — better known as the Spanish singer and songwriter C. Tangana.
“When someone leaves a little bit of room on the stage for things to happen, it’s very nice. Because you can take a gamble and you can f*** it up. To be aware of that and to see it is exciting. That’s what I feel when I see players playing. And the closest thing to football there is in music.”
Alvarez is well-placed to comment on both subjects. Born in Madrid, he has won nine Latin Grammy awards for his distinctive music, which straddles genres such as rap, flamenco and pop. His latest release is close to his heart: an anthem composed in celebration of Celta Vigo’s centenary year called Oliveira Dos Cen Anos (Galician for 100-year Olive Tree).
Despite being born and brought up in the Spanish capital, Alvarez is closely connected to Celta. His father’s family is from Vigo and he is a lifelong fan of the team located in north west Spain. That meant he stood out at school, where many of his classmates supported Real Madrid.
“It has been very difficult,” says the 33-year-old, speaking exclusively with The Athletic, of composing the anthem for Celta “I’ve felt a pressure again that I hadn’t felt for many, many years. I did it for Celta because it is Celta. Because I was looking forward to it and it was a dream of mine as a child. But I wouldn’t do it for any other club, institution or brand.”
Alvarez would not have been given that opportunity had he not been bold back in February 2021. That was when he came across a poll from a Vigo radio station on Twitter asking which musician or band should compose Celta’s centenary anthem. After voting for one of the four options — local punk rock group Siniestro Total — he replied with a question: “Can I try?”
Alvarez was at the top of his musical game at the time. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, his album 2021 El Madrileno was played almost religiously across Spain. It was played more than five million times in one day on Spotify, making it the most-played debut Spanish-language album in the platform’s history.
Many wondered why someone from Madrid — one of Alvarez’s many pseudonyms is El Madrileno — wanted to compose Celta’s anthem but “the other half (were) happy”, he says. Few knew about his connection to Vigo, although he says locals had been aware for a long time. They regularly see him in the bars of the Galician city, which he calls ‘garitos’ (a word that is very typical of Madrid).
Celta have never won La Liga and have experienced some difficult times in their 100-year history, having been in the second division as recently as 2012. But they have also punched above their weight in Europe — they became known as “EuroCelta” thanks to their success on the continent in the late 1990s and early 2000s and narrowly lost to Manchester United in the Europa League semi-finals in 2017.
C. Tangana at Celta’s Balaidos stadium (Photo: Rocio Aguirre)
This summer, they named Rafa Benitez as their manager and Alvarez has already been in touch with the former Liverpool, Real Madrid and Valencia boss. Last month, he posted screenshots of an Instagram conversation with the new Celta coach in which he shared a teaser of his club anthem. Benitez responded by saying he was sure Alvarez’s songs would motivate his players and joked it would be just as helpful “if you put the shirt on and score a couple of goals”.
“When I was a kid, being a Celta fan meant you were quite respected because you were from a medium-sized team that was suddenly doing well,” Alvarez says.
“During that time (the EuroCelta years) it went well, but most of the time it’s difficult, especially when the team is not doing well. You have to fight and put up with some comments… But it was a way to distinguish myself. In Vigo, being a Celta fan is something normal and people don’t experience it in the same way in terms of identity as if you are a Celta fan in Madrid.”
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Spanish football is dominated by Madrid and Barcelona — so much so that if someone follows another team, they are often expected to support one of the big two as well. Alvarez faced those same questions when he was younger.
“They were surprised that I was a Celta fan, and instead of asking me if I followed another Madrid team they’d asked if I supported Madrid or Barca,” Alvarez says. “They didn’t ask about Atletico or Rayo Vallecano. And that p***** me off because I’m from Madrid.
“It always made me angry because my father preferred Barca, he was very much a (Pep) Guardiola man, a total football and tiki-taka fan. But it didn’t matter to me; I only cared about Celta.”
C. Tangana performing in Marbella last year (Photo: Jorge Guerrero/AFP via Getty Images)
Alvarez is not the kind of fan who watches matches in a bar — a very Spanish tradition — or at home. He prefers the crowds in the stadium.
“I like the communion,” he explains. “I feel that football is something religious. I always watch football in company. What I like the most is to feel that a lot of people put themselves in the hands of those emotions. That’s the biggest thing for me.”
The sense of communion is something Alvarez looks for in his music. He swapped rap for wider influences some time ago, often taking inspiration from older and not very mainstream musical genres that are typical to Spain. He has ended up creating hits with that style.
“When I started to be more successful and to travel around the world, I realised that what I missed most were the things I liked about Spain,” Alvarez says. “Simple things. I realise that globalisation and the urban genre are making us all the same in terms of influences.
“I realised that I wanted to run away from that and I started listening to more and more old music. Then I started to generate almost an obligation to use the music that seems to me to be the most characteristic (of Spain). I wanted to use that over the aesthetics that Instagram gives us and the more trendy culture, everything that appears on TikTok — everything that everyone is consuming.
“One of the things we’ve done has been to put emotion ahead of everything else. That’s what’s got people hooked. The music we listen to now is quite far removed from emotion; it’s much colder music than before. Before, music was for crying, laughing, getting angry. It’s as if music no longer belongs to celebrating something with your family.”
Alvarez believes something similar has happened to football over the years, with fans having less incentive to watch local teams such as Celta.
Estadio Balaidos (Photo by Octavio Passos/Getty Images)
“Globalisation makes football even smaller,” he says. “Everyone has access to watch a Barca or Real Madrid match. That takes away from the spectacular nature of local football.
“Before, you didn’t have that possibility: you could listen to it on the radio but people went to the pitch and every time you went there it was a strong emotion.”
Just like the Spanish folk music Alvarez has drawn on, football is something that is passed down from parents to their children — which is why he loves the sport so much. And there is nothing that transcends generations like a football team’s anthem.
The song he has composed is heartfelt and based on Galician culture. Alvarez says Celta represents ‘morrina’ for him — a Spanish word deriving from Galician that means a sadness or melancholy usually associated with a longing for one’s homeland. The music video was a chance for him to explain what the club represents to the rest of the world.
“The most important thing I would highlight is having chosen the Vigo ‘ria’ (river) as an example of a people and a club that is very hard-working,” he says. “A town built around the sea, the work and the food that the sea provides.
“On the musical side, what I wanted to highlight above the bagpipes, above the things we are used to from Galicia, is the percussion and the female voices. Galicia has a tradition of ‘pandereteiras’ (a type of female musical group from Galicia). For me, it is what has the most strength at an international level. I have travelled all over the world listening to folk music and there is nothing more impressive than listening to Galician voices and percussion.”
The next step is for Alvarez to perform the anthem at Balaidos, Celta’s home ground.
“I don’t know how I could do it because I would have to get a choir of more than 100 people,” he says with a laugh.
“As well as some of the fans singing in time, we need a lot of percussion. It’s like setting up an orchestra in Balaidos. But of course, I can imagine it. It’s one of my dreams.”
(Top photo: Ricardo Rubio/Europa Press via Getty Images)
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