This debate was moderated by the cultural journalist Eduardo Guillot and gathered the responsibles of the self-managed festival Funtastic Dracula Carnival, with 18 years of trajectory, Paloma Borbone, co-director and CEO; the 16 Toneladas rock club, that programmes more than 200 concerts annually and managed by José de Rueda; and the record label and independent distributor of the underground shop Flexidiscos, in which Óscar will perform. 

The goal of this session, according to the Observatory, was to reflect on the importance that the local scenes generation has in the development of the cultural ecosystem of the territory (culture of rock, collaborative networks, programme circuits, diverse communities and interactions) and how this generates a number of impacts that transcend the purely cultural to include the economic and social as well.  

The main figures
Paloma Borbone has played in many rock and roll bands. For 18 years, she has been in management, along with Álvaro Coalla-Varo, from Funtastic Dracula Carnival, a self-managed music festival in the city of Benidorm that gathers every year almost 2.000 people of every part of the world, attracted by non-conventional posters, mixing more veteran groups with young people who begin to emerge, all part of the underground, selling out the tickets in seconds.

José de Rueda, manager and programmer of the 16 Toneladas rock club, started his trajectory in the musical sector at the age of 16, “loading and unloading at concerts in the Plaza de Toros, Viveros, Arena Auditorium... (it started like that in the music industry back then), while I was studying industrial electronics”, he affirmed. After that, he worked as sound and lighting assistant and technician. “I went on tour with great assemblies and in winter I had constant jobs in Canal 9, Palau de la Música and in clubs like Roxy Club, and I worked sporadically in other clubs and in many open-air concerts. At the age of 24 I opened my first rock and roll bar: The Kraken Rock Bar, where I tried to do every cultural activity I could, from acoustic concerts to Café-théâtre performances, Short Films Cycles and literary Jams”, he remembered. After 11 years of management, “It was clear that my vocation was to schedule events and the best of all was to assemble my own concert hall without giving any explanations to anyone. My friend (practically family) Poldo trusted me and the two of us have been doing more than 200 concerts a year at the 16 Toneladas for nine years”. 

Óscar, on the other hand, defines Flexidiscos as “a record label and independent distributor of discs, casettes, Cds and fanzines that leans to styles such as punk, post-punk, hardcore, pop and electronic music. We were a physical shop for nine years, but finally, we closed and now we keep with the sales by post mail and on events”.