Manu Chao is famous for blending musical styles but even for him his latest album is a departure: a collaboration with psychiatric patients who run an Argentine radio station called Radio Loony.
The Spanish-French singer recorded the album in Jose Borda, a psychiatric hospital in Buenos Aires which is home to Radio La Colifata, a name derived from slang for lunatic.
The album, Viva La Colifata!, features 20 songs about life, love, loneliness, death, sunshine, mothers and the end of the world. It mixes some old Chao tunes with mostly new material from the singer and patients, including poetry and improvisations. The idea, according to the publicity blurb, is to “laugh, cry and meditate about life”.
The album is available for free download at VivaLaColifata.org, a website launched by Chao and the radio station, but people are asked to make a donation to help the hospital’s pioneering approach to treating mental illness.
Launched in 1991 as a way to give patients a voice, the station’s eclectic amalgam of chat, jokes, music and poetry became a hit and reached 12 million people in Argentina’s capital. Chao, 48, who promotes leftist causes and sings in French, Spanish, English and Arabic, became involved in Radio La Colifata a decade ago after reading an article in a French newspaper. He visited the crumbling monolithic building, befriended patients, hosted music workshops and developed the idea of making an album.
The American country singer Johnny Cash recorded a classic live album at Folsom prison in 1968 but Chao is believed to be the first star to record at a psychiatric hospital.