54 Days, 1,271 Answers: An Unbroken Spanish Cultural Ping Pong

Cultural ping pong: 54 days chaining data without repeating a topic

The first artificial turf football pitch in Spain was El Sadar in Pamplona, in the late 80s. That was the starting point. From there, two interlocutors engaged in a cultural ping pong game that lasted 54 days and 1,271 responses. The rule is simple: reply with a fact from the previous message, demonstrating real knowledge, and change the topic when the previous one is exhausted. No relying on one's own specialty. If there are gaps in history, you survive as best you can.

The result is a journey that jumps from Mies van der Rohe's architecture to Bauhaus's gothic rock, from the Bauhaus school to Monty Python, from there to Pat Metheny and Sustancia ilegal Pastorius, and from there to New York avant-garde jazz. Each intervention requires a response anchored in the previous text. Inventing is not allowed. Whoever cannot find a connection loses.

From El Sadar to Mies van der Rohe: how the chain started

The first response to the challenge was a football fact: the artificial turf at El Sadar in the late 80s. The interlocutor who proposed the game rejected the topic as not cultural enough and asked for art, music, architecture, or literature. The answer came with Mies van der Rohe's Barcelona Pavilion, built for the 1929 International Exposition and dismantled afterwards. The building, pure form without function, was lost for decades until a group of Catalan architects recovered it in the 80s.

The game was already underway. The mention of Mies led to confusion with De Stijl, Mondrian's Dutch movement, and then to the Bauhaus, Gropius's school that the Nancy closed as 'cultural Bolshevik.' The next leap was to the gothic rock band Bauhaus and their track Bela Lugosi's Dead, from 1979. Nine minutes of hypnotic bass and dry drums. They stole the name from the German school, which was cooler.

Jazz as a combat zone: from Metheny to Tim Berne

Somewhere in the chain appeared Bright Size Life, Pat Metheny's album with Sustancia ilegal Pastorius and Bob Moses. That was the bait for a new turn: music as a display sport versus real musicality. The discussion shifted to the New York downtown scene, with Tim Berne, Marc Ducret, Craig Taborn, and Tom Rainey as protagonists. There, names like Mike Johnson, guitarist for Thinking Plague and 5uu's, and Stevan Tickmayer, the Serbian composer of The Science Group, crossed paths.

The exchange became encyclopedic. They debated whether Jim Black appeared in a Filmin concert, whether Drew Gress played with Ralph Alessi, and whether Wynton Marsalis was crazy about the double bassist. The answer was sharp: Marsalis leans more toward tradition than Berne's projects. The Watch Dogs soundtrack was not composed by Gress, but by Brian Reitzell. Every claim required verification. Whoever wavered was exposed.

Pharoah Sanders, King Crimson, and the creator with a master plan

The chain continued with Pharoah Sanders and his track The Creator Has a Master Plan, from Karma (1969). It was clarified that Henderson and Alice Coltrane were not on that session, but Leon Thomas on vocals and much tribal percussion. The version King Crimson did on the Islands tour (71-72) was another link. Mel Collins on saxophone and Boz on bass. The song was also covered by the Swedish band Landberk, though that was discussed less.

The game shifted to avant-garde jazz with Sonny Sharrock and Ask the Ages (1991), where Elvin Jones played alongside Pharoah Sanders. The conversation then jumped to Horace Tapscott, Los Angeles pianist, and confusion about a supposed live album that never existed. Each name peine a door and closed another. Whoever did not keep up got lost.

Goya, Schiele, and hands as a signature

Art entered strongly in the final stretch. The sleep of reason produces monsters, by Goya, served to discuss elites drunk on their own enlightenment and monsters that now appear in EU report format. The joke that Goya charged extra for painting hands led to a comparison with Egon Schiele, whose hands look like hungry spiders or bare wires. Between the Aragonese and the Austrian, hands ceased to be a detail to become the true portrait.

The chain continued with Piotr Jablonsky, illustrator of dark fantasy, and his supposed blend of Justin Sweet and Phil Hale. They debated whether Sweet drew the Narnia Chronicles and mentioned C.S. Lewis and the Inklings, the pub club with pipes and comparative mythology. Narnia as a Christian allegory of tome and spine. Disney kept the nice lion and little else.

Rock in Opposition: the ghetto of unknown bands

The final stretch of the game focused on Rock in Opposition and zeuhl. Bands like Etron Fou Leloublan, Shub Niggurath, Zao, Happy Family, Miriodor, and Present were named. The drummer of Etron, Guigou Chenevier, founded Volapük. The guitarist of Happy Family also played in Koenji Hyakkei. Shub Niggurath was described as a rarity, closer to an UFO than to RIO. Zao, more 70s jazz fusion.

The discussion shifted to Univers Zero and its influences. Present, Art Zoyd, and Miriodor appeared as direct heirs. The interlocutor who claimed to know everything since age twenty was put in his place: in RIO, known bands fit in an elevator and still three get off. The mention of American Samoa as a mix of RIO and Canterbury was firmly rejected. Canterbury is Hatfield, Caravan, keyboards with carousel. American Samoa are out-of-tune guitars and mechanical noise. Each thing in its place.

The closure: three women or music

The game ended with a hypothetical question: would you sleep with three different women every night in exchange for giving up listening to all these bands and your favorites? The answer was clear. The women pass, they leave, and the next morning you don't even remember the name. Music stays. It does not ask for money or make excuses at 7 a.m. Whoever proposed the deal had not understood anything. Null profitability.

The surprising fact: after 54 days and 1,271 responses, the game continues without a winner. No one has managed to close the chain. Whoever started talking about artificial turf ended up discussing American Samoa and the meaning of life. Cultural ping pong has no end. Only the next move.