On Sunday, July 19, while the World Cup final between Spain and Argentina was taking place, millions of people listened to Aserejé at the start of the first hydration break. Pilar Muñoz, one of the members of the group Las Ketchup, was not particularly thrilled. “I must be very strange,” she says. Her sisters Lola and Lucía were, and they started receiving messages from friends and acquaintances asking if they were watching. “It made me laugh, it’s cool that they remember you,” adds Lucía. The Muñoz sisters speak from the comfort of their homes, each in the corner where they feel most comfortable, while chatting about fame, a worldwide hit, and an exhaustion that almost took them down, and a music career that is still alive. Very much alive. Three days before this interview was conducted, they performed at Barcelona Pride and have a summer full of concerts ahead, both inside and outside Spain.
In 2027, it will be 25 years since the song composed by Manuel Ruiz Queco became a worldwide hit. Many years since that first meeting in a bar between the composer and producer and the daughters of El Tomate. “They brought a notebook full of song lyrics. That didn’t last long, but it was very intense and there was a lot of laughter,” he says.
The fame back then, with a song playing everywhere at the same time, caught them off guard. “We went out cold on the field,” says Queco. “We have kept our feet on the ground. We never said, oh how great, how amazing, I hope it doesn’t end. We hardly enjoyed anything because of the exhaustion,” comments Pilar (44 years old). “We didn’t ask for it either. It happened and that’s it,” adds Lucía (47 years old). Lola (45 years old) says that since they started she has tried not to see herself, neither in concerts, on television nor “doing anything ketchup, which she has always removed from the middle because she has always tried to keep her feet on the ground. And those feet, always, alongside those of her sisters.
“We were very badly advised. If it weren’t for working with my sisters, I would have another job, I would be doing other things, because it’s devastating. You might think we exaggerate, but the work we did 24 years ago is not done like that today. Nobody cared if you woke up in the middle of the night not knowing where you were, they didn’t care if you didn’t have time to eat, if you had your period and your whole body hurt. Having each other is what saved us,” says Lola. Lucía, who speaks little but is decisive, assures that the goal back then was to squeeze out everything possible, even if it crushed them. “And even so, we went to work with our best smile,” she clarifies. “When I took the first plane and then another and then another, I told my mother I didn’t know if my body would hold up. But it does,” adds Pilar.
Success has taken them to unexpected places and situations. They remember a five-day tour in Japan that started every day at five in the morning. But before that, around 3:30, a group of women would enter their rooms to tell them what clothes to wear so there would be time to do everything. They also remember a visit to a Buddhist temple in Thailand, one of those gifts work took them to. Pilar does not forget the time she ran into David Bowie: “I still love him today and I love his music, having him close was amazing.”
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Lucía, however, stays with what they are living now. “I’m still surprised that so many years later we go on stage and still have such a good time, that we can’t go on vacation because we have so much work, and that we know how to enjoy it now more than before, from maturity and managing everything ourselves.”
Two of them are single mothers. Lucía is the only one who doesn’t do sports. “Let’s see if next time we talk I tell you something else,” she jokes. She also jokes about something that has been published about her for some time: “What’s this about me having a hair salon? I’ve never had anything like that in my life! But hey, maybe one day we’ll get it. So much has been said that I think now I want it, so we’ll all be fabulous.”
While finishing what will be their new album, this summer they will be going back and forth to France to perform. They will also sing in Switzerland, and in Spain, of course, where there are always things going on. “I, who am always dreading the summer tour, this year there has been no difference from other months. In summer we don’t stop and lately not in winter either. And thank God,” says Lucía. More mature, calmer, with a full schedule. “And zero guilt,” says Lola.
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