Message for the Rolling Stones from Gorki and a new song from PPR "Down with you know who"

A message from punk rocker Gorki Águila to the Rolling Stones on their upcoming concert in Cuba and the nature of music censorship in the island.


"Ehhh, listen to what I gotta say, my brother. We, when you go over there, I’m talking with you Mick Jagger, yes, you, look over here, over here, you and your band. When you go over there and when Obama goes over there to Cuba. We will probably be stuck in a cell in the MININT (Ministry of the Interior). 

I don’t know if we’ll be able to play a small concert in the cell, but most probably they’ll put each musician in his own cell and we won’t be able to hear each other, you see? I’m a musician that’s censored in Cuba. I’m a musician that doesn’t have the right that you have to play where you want, understand? So at least inform yourself. That’s all I ask. Yell whatever you like but inform yourself.

And if you want to play because you want to play in a tyranny, do whatever you want to do but this; hopefully this gets to you, what I’m talking about here. 

"In Cuba musicians are censored." - Gorki [Artwork by Sergio Lastre]

 In Cuba musicians are censored. There are musicians that aren’t allowed to play; there are women that are beaten [by the Castro regime]. And I would love to tell it to the artists, my brother, inform yourselves first about what’s going on in Cuba and at least let out a “down with Castro” you know, a little one, my brother. Come on Rolling Stones, go for it, my brother. Ah Keith Richards! Keith Richards, he’s crazier. Keith Richards, say something, my little brother, say something, go for it with 100,000 watts, 'Down with you know who!'” 

The new song from Porno para Ricardo, "Down with you know Who" exposes Castro regime's anti-rock n roll and censorship back ground.


When people ask if progress has been made on the music scene in Cuba, an important question arises. "What does it say about the regime in Cuba that British and American rock bands are now heard over the airwaves in Cuba and The Rolling Stones are playing a concert tonight in Cuba and at the same time the music of Cuban musicians of the stature of Celia Cruz and Olga Guillot remain censored in Cuba, even though they passed away years ago?"

Claim were made in 2012 that the censorship of these artists had been quietly ended but official channels internally confirmed that it was not true. On August 21, 2012 Tony Pinelli, a well known musician and radio producer, distributed an e-mail in which Rolando Álvarez, the national director of the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television Instituto Cubano de Radio y Televisión (ICRT) confirmed that the music of the late Celia Cruz would continue to be banned. The e-mail clearly stated: 

"All those who had allied with the enemy, who acted against our families, like Celia Cruz, who went to sing at the Guantanamo Base, the ICRT arrogated to itself the right, quite properly, not to disseminate them on Cuban radio." 

The irony that it was the Castro regime, that acted against Cuban families dividing them for over half a century, in 1962 denied Celia Cruz's request to return to Cuba to attend her mother's burial. She never again tried to return to Cuba after that and passed away in exile in 2003. Three years after John Lennon's statue was unveiled by Fidel Castro in a park in Havana, Cuba.