A couple of weeks ago I was in town on a Friday night and we ended up at Comida.

Comida's the new tapas joint on The Strand, set in behind the Phoenix and distinguished by the fact that none of my friends can remember its name. For some reason the word Comida (which I'm led to believe means 'food” in Spanish) simply will not stick in people's minds.
But it's easy to find and we were hunkered down in their courtyard enjoying little bites of pleasure with vaguely Spanish provenance when a guitarist started playing, just a single acoustic guitar and a microphone, and he sounded fantastic. With the Strand still awash with cover outfits parleying the same general catalogue of popular favourites this was something genuinely different. And extremely cool.

A brave move
The guitarist's name is Santiago Rebagliati, one of the few Tauranga musicians to play music full-time, a brave move that he undertook last year. I caught up with him earlier this week.
But, firstly, a little correction from the last column. I was writing about the rather wonderful soulful electronic balladeer James Blake. His new album, which I am still enjoying immensely, is Overgrown, not Homegrown. Call it brain fade.
Right, back to where we started.
Santiago has been kicking around the music scene for several years now. He's a native of Argentina who's been living in Tauranga for a decade or so. For a few years he played guitar in a duo with singer Tim Mellalieu and the pair released a couple of CDs, the second under the name The Locos. He also formed a three-piece rock band with Brett Standon on drums and Paul Bloxham on bass releasing the 2008 album Waiting For 2012 under the name Perfectamundo.
But keeping a band together is a hard road and there aren't a lot of gigs around for any sort of outfit that's hoping to play something vaguely original. Like pretty much every other musician in town Santi (as everyone knows him) kept his day job in construction, working on ceiling and paying the rent.
Until his birthday, last February.
He quit his job.

New stages
And, if this story was following traditional lines he would immediately have launched himself into music. But he didn't. Like many he was uncertain what direction to take. The epiphany came on the trip he immediately took back to his homeland of Argentina, with a side jaunt to Chile. It was in Chile that a Tango dancer and actor, a friend of his partner, asked him to play at a Tango bar, El Cachafaz.
So, the gig was a huge success and doors opened? Nope. Again, not the traditional story. Santi was not great, he was rusty. He finished the gig saying to himself 'I'm better than that.”
And he is. Back in New Zealand he started working with a primitive loop delay, enabling him to set up rhythms live and then play over them – you know, the whole 'looping” thing that the likes of Liam Finn and K T Tunstall groove on.
So Santi released the CD of a dozen original songs he'd been working on in his home studio for the previous year (Le Bonheur de Vivre, reviewed very favourably by NZ Musician) and started really getting into his solo material. He got a better loop pedal, and has just added a beautiful new ArtLutherie acoustic guitar from Canada.
Now he's gigging regularly, either solo or in a duo with guitarist Derrin Richards or possibly a percussionist. But the core of it is what Santi is doing: loops set up by tapping on his guitar and then creating a rhythm guitar bed; a fascinating range of Latin American-influenced material, be it a revamped Stones song or an obscure black immigrant Spanish tune from Majorca; and fabulously dexterous and fluid acoustic guitar playing.

Something different
It's a great sound – something different and dynamic, a breath of fresh air along The Strand. Currently Santi is playing every second Thursday with Derrin at De Bier Haus (soon to close for renovations) and every Friday at Comida. Plus all sorts of other bits. Check out his website at www.santiagorebagliati.com.
Good to have another full-time musician out there.