#kanaru

One day, a nameless band by young guys of Medellín needed a vocal, and then it was recommended a guy with a powerful and skilled voice who was getting some name in the underground rock scene of Medellín. But Elkin already was in Ferrotrack, so he put a condition to the guys: They had to practice a lot for a year, and if they were able of pull it the repertory, he would join them. Clearly, they got it. The day Elkin decided to leave Ferrotrack and join this project was June 18th, 1984. By then it was also decided, by idea of Elkin, the name of that band: Kraken.

The reason Elkin became the de facto leader was because he was the oldest one and he was the only who had the time for manage things such as the money of the lives, representate the guys or travelling in bus for get people for lives, since all his mates were still finishing school or doing University, by then. Also, his mates of then trusted him to write the lyrics of all the songs, something that he always liked.

The demo EPs made enough noise on Medellín, and eventually they earned enough attention to sign a music label contract and record Kraken I, who was successful on the local scene, a major goal, and eventually Kraken II, who led them to mainstream recognizement with Vestido de Cristal.

But Kraken also had loads of lineup changes, mostly because of the struggles to stay on a band, responsabilities, and in some cases the economical issue, since Colombian labels weren’t (and aren’t) really interested on support rock. By late 1995, the only remaining original member in the band was Elkin himself. Because of this, he decided to take a decision: To protect the band legally and make it an organization where he would be the general boss, because of suffering of the project because of the greed of the intermediaries. This is because for him, Kraken was not only his band, it was his life project. So, since 1996, he was the legal boss of the band, not only a leader. This did not save the band of too many changes until 00s, but was a warrant of survivance for the project over the years.

Only after of this decision, Kraken could eventually manage to do a live album, the Huella y Camino, their most sold release. But in 2003, Elkin decided to move from Medellín to Bogotá, tired of the stagnation of the scene of his hometown. He even dared to say that if the band stayed in Medellín, it would have disbanded. Only then, he could form what is today the actual lineup, and the project Kraken Filarmónico, pioneer in Colombia and Latin America, as well as a theater-concept live such as the 30 years lives and stay in the scene, with high-quality albums and international tours for several parts of Latin America, even despite of the issues with mainstream media.

But in 2015, he was found with a brain malign tumour, what put temporally Kraken VI in a hold because of surgeries and very expensive treatments, but still he managed to record the vocals. Sadly, after of the release (September 2016), his health decayed fast, though most details of the actual situation were known only by 2017. While his passing was for most fans a shock, because they did really expect Elkin to survive, when the details of the situation were known, it was revealed that by December 2016, his days were already numbered.

The moment I decided to get interested to Kraken, officially, was January 26th 2017, because of a class of German. It was three days before of Elkin’s passing as final result of his illness: January 29th. I still remember the shock and surprise when I did see a tweet of a journal here, as well as remembering my classes. One week later, I looked for them in Spotify, and then my life turned out a madness.

If I have to describe him from what I learned all this time, I realized this guy just caused me a major shortcut in my potato brain. Even after he left this world, his music and legacy had kept touching the hearts of people. It shocked me seriously that he was already describe as kind and humble by others even when he was alive, I remember clearly my drama when I got Filarmónico album, from 2006, and I did read the text of Mr. Jaramillo (director of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá for this album) talking about Elkin. I think it’s a major drama to me because a band like Kraken I found it when I was already dealing with major disappointment of people, and I had became a very gloomy person. I still have some of these traits, but I admit that they had subdued.

It is impressive he had this powerful stage presence, this powerful voice, and at same time being a soft-spoken guy, and very sweet from what I could analyze. I still feel sometimes very angry with myself that I took forever to find about him. But, life allowed me to meet his son and his bandmates of the actual lineup. And, this talks more of him than what I would think: Andrés Ramírez is obvious his sweetness is because he was well-raised and his job for the band had been very good. And the kindness of the actual lineup and their compromise for keep the job, is a good reason to understand why this is the most stable lineup of Kraken.

In March 2016, the guys of the actual lineup organized a pair of small lives as a in-life tribute to their boss. About this, Elkin only said that what he dreamed the most with his band was to have something like a family, and that day he realized that he had it.

With this part I finish the “Kanaru Presents” series with Kraken.

Gracias a una amistad en común y el reloj estando a nuestro favor... esto fue posible, sabiendo que Luis está siempre ocupado. Me alegra que los tres la hayamos pasado genial, hayamos podido conversar y tener un rato tranquilo. No tengo aún palabras para agradecerlo... a los dos. Las palabras no son suficientes.

Gracias, Lucho, por aceptar mi aprecio hacia ti y espero que podamos llevarnos bien y ser, tal vez, amigos. Es todo lo que podría pedirle a la vida.

Sé que has tenido una semana difícil, por lo que nos contaste, tanto a mi amiga como a mi. Pero pude darme cuenta que durante este rato has sido feliz y que realmente necesitabas pensar en algo, así sea por una hora, que no fuera la dureza del día a día.

A mi amiga, gracias. Sé que esto ni siquiera fue mi idea, fue tuya. Gracias por ofrecerme esta oportunidad. Que la vida te de lo mejor posible, sé que lo mereces y lo necesitas en medio de tus dificultades personales.

Habrán tantas cosas que de ahora en adelante en el camino de la vida me recordarán este día. Que me recordarán que, a pesar de mi incredulidad incluso con fotos en mano y todo, que este día ocurrió. Que no fue un sueño.

Para mi, además, se me ha adelantado el cumple. El próximo viernes, el 29, es mi cumpleaños. Y dudo muchísimo que cualquier experiencia u objeto puedan superar como regalo este día.

Este año ha sido y es una locura. He conocido personas increíbles y he aprendido mucho no solo en términos académicos, sino humanos y afectivos. Es como si la vida me hubiera dado una segunda oportunidad, y no me arrepiento de nada.

No olvidaré la conversa, la taza de café, aquella vista de la ciudad, ese semblante tranquilo, esa cadencia suave en la voz.

Luis Ramírez, es un honor y una alegría haberte conocido, y agradezco a la vida por ello. Sé que esto ha sido posible gracias a la muy loca decisión de sacar a Kraken de mi lista de espera y poner “No me hables de amor” en la versión del Filarmónico en mi Spotify. Es gracias a esto que todo esto ha ocurrido. Esto no es el colofón, es solo una pequeña parte de todo esto, sé que no será la última vez ni el ápice. Y sé que todo esto me acompañará en esta vida.

He aprendido que incluso para mi, la lluvia nunca dura para siempre, y que siempre volverá a brillar el sol.

Por eso mi sentimiento de agradecimiento no tiene palabras.

He’s not musician, though he has some basic singing skills and he’s not bad on it. He had been keeping a very low profile most part of his life and he was fine enjoying life on his job on theater.

His “debut on society” was in December 18th 2013, actually, when his presence began to be more noticed by the fans of Kraken. He had been assessing the musicians and writing the plot of the live performance: All the dystopic concept who was managed on the live was his idea. To the end of the live, his father introduced him to people for thank him for his job: Elkin decided to trust his son, the closest person he had avaliable at the moment with knowledge about theater performance, for the delicate job of the stage design for the DVD of the 30 years of his project.

Andrés is Elkin’s only son, result of one of his earlier relationships. Andrés explained a lot of times he did know that one day, he would end up taking the legal rights and administrative ownership of what’s called “Organización Kraken”, the project of his father. But, this is not something he expected to happen so early.

Before of continue, I will explain what I understood of the organizational structure of Kraken, since the band is an small organization since mid-late 90s (I will explain better in the Elkin section of the photoset): The position of singer and of general director (the owner of the band) are two separated ones, but for a lot of years, Elkin Ramírez had the two positions. With Elkin’s passing, the position of official singer is actually vacant, but the one of general director is already taken: Andrés, who inherited it due legal reasons.

Because of this, Andrés had to leave his low profile and had been receiving a lot of attention, in quality of the son of Elkin and administrative owner of the band. Often representating on some interviews, being asked complicated questions, and so on. To this date, I think his job had been very good, since he knows from all his life the job from inside of his father with the band, and has by his side the support and experience of the actual manager (Germán Morales, a very cool guy), the musicians and the rest of the staff. I feel happy of all he had been doing for keep the legacy of his father regarding Colombian rock.

I often try to pay more attention to his role as theater actor and as administrative director, but not much to the fact he’s the son of the singer who fucked up my brain in 2017 year. But, for moments, I am reminded that information is very important: Like when I decided to do the keychains of the giftbox. I was very conscious of it, to the point of decide that the minimum requirement is that Andrés receives a keychain with a drawing of his father and if I fail that requirement, I would shoot myself with a banana. Fortunately this requirement was fulfilled and also the musicians received their keychains.

But how I could do it, and who received it? Against all the odds, I met him and it was one of craziest moments of my life. I think the probabilities of succeed on give it, and especially to him, weren’t very high. But it happened because a friend I met in the queue had seen Andrés while my friend was coming to drink a beer, so we began to run to where he was. Then suddenly I found myself talking with Andrés Ramírez, explaining him the giftbox and asking him for a selfie and to sign the drawing I did of his father. To this day, I still ask myself: HOW THE FUCK THIS HAPPENED. So in the end, as a very epic feat of destiny, he received the box and he was the one who distributed the material with the musicians. It was done fast, if I am aware I met Julián Puerto one hour later and he told me he already had his keychain.

In some special circunstances he sung some songs of Kraken, but it’s very rare he does it, and he only does it in duet with proper singers, and only with some songs because Andrés has a lot of things who would make him hard perform the songs of his father: The most notorious is Andrés’ register: He’s a baritone, and does not manage so much high notes, while his father had a longer register and his high notes were really high.

The giftbox thing is not the only one of my happy experiences with Andrés. After of it, a lot of crazy things happened. But to this day, I still have around the selfie I took with him. It was so important that photo that I had to put it on my FB profile, and it lasted some time, a photo I consider so epic that the only way I would change it had to be if something really epic would ever happen again. Well, in the end that happened because I met Lucho and so on.

The seventh and last part of this photoset will feature Elkin Ramírez. Due the tragic circunstances, it will be something hard to do, so I left it to the end. I hope you keep enjoying this photoset.

During the last phases of the recording of Humana Deshumanización album, by early 2009, Carlos Cortés left the band. In 2018 year Rubén Gélvez revealed, without giving names, that he left because of internal conflicts. Because of this, Julián Puerto auditioned and joined. He was already working with Kraken as rehearsal replacement drummer by late 2008 under recommendation of Rubén, his long-term friend and his bandmate in La Xtrema, so he was invited to begin to work with the band after of the definitive leaving of Cortés: The last person to leave officially Kraken (since Elkin Ramírez never made such announcement and was considered officially the vocals of Kraken until the day of his death, and his position as official singer is treated as irreplaceable). Eventually, he joined. Still, Carlos Cortés got the credits he deserved as performer of drums and as coauthor of the songs of Humana.

While Julián became the last one of the actual lineup to join (without count the special situation of Ricardo Wolff), he’s experienced on the music industry, since around 1992-1993. Also he has not only knowledge and experience in rock, also has experience on pop, rap, and latin rhythms, among so many others. He’s also a producer. He also has some singing skills, being often trusted on live on back vocals, but this role is not often on studio recordings, such as Kraken VI, but on live performances. Often, filling the spaces of studio-only back vocals.

Julián is recognized for his versatility and technique, sober but efficient, powerful, energic and full of feeling. The energy think is so remarkable that it’s said that on the final timed rehearsals of Kraken Filarmónico 2014 Julián was ending up worn out by the half of the performance. This forced to all the band to keep more measured and calmed performances for avoid tiredness.

Off-stage, he’s described as very mellow, humble and sweet person with everybody, and even his thank-you texts are very effusive. But for some reason, he likes to pose as rude guy on the photos with fans, unless when he’s too tired to even think about it.

Out of all the musicians of Kraken, Julián was the first one I met personally. I met him shortly before of the live of May 28th while I was doing the queue, and it was around one hour after I fulfilled the mission of give to the band the box, by giving it to Andrés Ramírez. I found Julián taking a breath, sitting on a little place, and I asked to someone on the queue if the person was Julián because he looked to me very familiar. Honestly I was not sure what I wanted to tell him, I decided it out of the blue because of yeah. He told me he was very tired, and I told him I knew because I was worried of the band performing three days in a row and with travelling. When I talked him about the box, he got surprised because of meeting the person who did the keychains, and I think I got the shock of my life because of his hug. I also met him a pair of times afterwards, he’s very kind and cool.

I hope you like this photoset as much as I did. Now I finished the instrumentists photosets, the next one will be of the actual “boss”, Andrés, and i will close with Elkin.

He began on Kraken carrying cables and the equipment of the band, and eventually began to work with the band on his specialty: stage production, graphic designer on the albums. By then he had formed a good friendship with Elkin and the rest of the band. For Elkin, Ricardo was almost a brother, given the affinity because of coming of the same city. Ricardo’s creativity and aesthetical taste gave a lot on the image of Kraken in the visual aspects since then.

Humana Deshumanización was recorded with a musical structure who required two guitars in live, so it was being really hard for Andrés Leiva to perform the songs with only guitar. Because of it, Elkin asked Ricardo to audition when he remembered Ricardo played guitars, and he became the second guitar of Kraken: The first time Kraken having two guitars since the times of Kraken V (1995, with Henry Borrero and Byron Sánchez). Since then, Ricardo performs as second guitar, to this date. His debut lives were the lives who served as presentation of Humana Deshumanización album, in October 2009.

Ricardo is mostly known among the fans because of being very reserved on-stage, often being on the back, behind the outgoing ones like Lucho and Elkin. Sometimes, giving the impression of being more like a support than a full-fledged member. Off-stage, he is known because of being the most serious one, not only in person, also in social networks. On Kraken VI booklet, Ricardo even apologizes to his bandmates on his thank-you text because of being a “grumpy”. But in spite of his seriousness, he’s very emotional regarding Kraken, and defends the project fiercely. He’s also trusted in live for back vocals, being his one of most known characteristic, powerful and notorious on live performances.

In spite of being the last one to join Kraken as musician, he’s the oldest one of the instrumentists, being the opposite of Luis Ramírez, who’s the first one who joined as musician on the actual lineup, but the youngest one of the band. For a while, Ricardo was also known for putting his beloved GoPro camera on the guitar and recording videos of his perspective of the lives, but he toned down this on the last years.

To this date, Ricardo is the only one of Kraken (without counting Elkin Ramírez because he passed away before I began to listen the band) I don’t know personally outside the stage. He’s a very good performer, though sometimes underrated because of not liking to be much noticed, and often overlooked when you have in the front the likes of extroverts like Lucho and Rubén, or the presence as lead guitar of Leiva. But, in spite of this I already have some amazing memories with him, since he was the first member of Kraken who acknowledged the project of the giftbox for the band, since he’ve seen photos of when I just began to build it with popsicles, as well as he’ve seen the handmade sketches of the drawings who later turned to be the keychains of Luis Ramírez and Andrés Leiva. I know it because I posted them in FB and he thanked me. He also recognized me in the middle of the crowd of Día de Rock Colombia 2017 (August 12th) and sent me greetings on the end of the live XDD. I have the feeling that though he is very serious, he’s kind.

I hope to meet him personally one day, though he’s the hardest one to reach of the band, because of living outside of Bogotá (actually he lives on a town named El Carmen del Viboral, in the same region where Medellín is), not just because I like him loads as musician, also because his signature is the only one I haven’t in my drawing of Elkin. I think Ricardo is the hardest to reach right now, with the second one being Andrés Ramírez (who lives in Medellín, but sometimes going to Bogotá for the lives and other stuff, and the last time I talked with him was in January 2018 in a fan event). And the easiest ones to me are the rest of the musicians, because of living in Bogotá and also because of their presence in other bands, and performing live very frequently with these projects, so there is always a chance of meet them performing or even on fan-events.

I hope you like this photoset as much as I did. If net allows me I will try to continue publishing other individual photosets of all the members of the band, as well as one special for Elkin’s son, Andrés Ramírez. (That’s the reason this series will have seven parts and not only one).