Artaud (French: [aʁto]; commonly pronounced [aɾˈto] by Hispanophones) is the third and final studio album credited to Argentine rock band Pescado Rabioso, released in October 1973 on Talent-Microfón.

[2][3] The short-lived Pescado Rabioso was a conscious shift from Spinetta's previous acoustic and melodic music, favoring a more violent,[4] "electric, raw and powerful style"[2] influenced by his new friendships within the "heavier" rock scene of Buenos Aires, which included acts such as Pappo's Blues, Manal and Tanguito.

[9] Amaya told Crítica Digital in 2009 that David Lebón and Carlos Cutaia left Pescado Rabioso to pursue their solo careers and that they communicated their disbandment to Spinetta in the Planeta theatre, which he took as a great offense.

[1] If we remember that in 1968 Los Abuelos de la Nada practically imposed the porteño version of psychedelic pop with "Diana divaga" and that in 1973 Luis Alberto Spinetta released Artaud—perhaps the pinnacle of Argentine rocker avant-garde—it is hard to accept that it was a mere temporary coincidence.

Writers often analyze Artaud in relation to the convulsive sociopolitical context of Argentina in 1973,[26] with the fall of the military dictatorship, Héctor José Cámpora's electoral win and the news of Perón's return bringing "a hope of liberty in the midst of oppression.

[nb 2][30] Some of the other musicians that went to Parque Centenario included Emilio Del Guercio, Rodolfo García, Gustavo Spinetta, Miguel Abuelo and,[32] "without integrating so much", Raúl Porchetto and León Gieco.

[27] In addition to Antonin Artaud, Spinetta read other French poets such as Arthur Rimbaud, René Daumal, Charles Baudelaire, Jean Cocteau, André Breton and Comte de Lautréamont.

[47][48][49] Spinetta reflected in 2008 that the album "represents a very interesting return to the creative source of songs within [him]" and that it established the possibility of deconstructing his previous work with Pescado Rabioso to "keep growing".

[50] Umberto Pérez of Spanish magazine Efe Eme felt that Spinetta "returned to the source to break it", as he "invoked the acoustic and free spirit of Almendra to capture one of the most intimate moments of his life".

[51] Perhaps the "most accessible moment" on Artaud,[52] opener "Todas las hojas son del viento" (English: "All Leaves Belong to the Wind") is a folk rock ballad[42] with a predominantly acoustic sound, although it contains an electric guitar solo at the end.

"[56] Pablo Schanton compared the song to Graham Nash's "Teach Your Children" and Pink Floyd, as it "provides light instructions for rockers who mature and form families, and must face paternity while being antipaternal.

[1] Written alongside partner Patricia Salazar, the lyrics of "Por" (Spanish preposition "through", also "by" and "for") are one of the most atypical in Spinetta's career, consisting of forty seven loose nouns chosen to fit the pre-existing melodic lines.

"[60] Regarding the song's lyrics, Pablo Schanton of Rolling Stone Argentina reflected: "There is a rediscovery of the poetic dimension of words that can only be achieved by freeing them from the sentence.

"[45] Spinetta leaves his acoustic vein in "Superchería" (a variation of Spanish "superstición", English: "superstition"[63] "quackery", particularly practiced on or by the ignorant) "trickery"), a song that according to journalist Walter Gazzo, would "fit very well" in Pescado Rabioso's previous albums.

[65][66] The song seems to explore or tap into feelings of metaphysical angst related to being vs nothingness: "Around your living room or outside of it you're not there/But there's someone else who's there/And it's not me/I'm only talking to you from here/He must be/The music that you've never made" (Spanish: "Por tu living o fuera de allí no estás/Pero hay otro que está/Y yo no soy/Yo sólo te hablo desde aquí/Él debe ser/La música que nunca hiciste") and later concludes: "The lights leaping in the distance/aren't waiting for you to go and turn them off" (Spanish: "Las luces que saltan a lo lejos/No esperan que vayas a apagarlas") The acoustic 9-minute "Cantata de puentes amarillos" (English: "Cantata of yellow bridges") is the album's centerpiece[44][67] and "most impactful" song.

"[68][73] CONICET's Jorge Monteleone described the song in 2010: "the voice of Spinetta is articulated solitarily in unexpected harmonic resolutions of the acoustic guitar and alternates rhythms where the images and the enunciative registers [...] overlap in modules, different from each other.

"[77] Kleiman felt that the final lines "And besides/You are the sun/Gently as well/You can be the moon" (Spanish: "Y además/Vos sos el sol/Despacio también/Podés ser la luna") have a "clear connection with hippie utopia, still present both in Luis' mind and in the dreams of his generation.

"[44] (English "To Starosta, the Idiot") In the final verses of the song, Spinetta sings "The idiot/I can't help him any longer/He'll burn/staring at the sun" (Spanish: "El idiota/ya nada puedo hacer por él/él se quemará/mirando al sol").

[83] Despite the novelty of its cover art, the label did not give Artaud any special promotional campaign and the album shared its October 1973 advertisement along with nine other titles, among them Lebón's debut, Color Humano 3, Confesiones de invierno and Aquelarre's Brumas.

Despite the sustained growth that the rock nacional movement had been experiencing, venues were made available sporadically and only in the morning or late night hours, as the genre had yet to "reach the necessary status to deserve the central schedules.

"[88] In addition to Spinetta as a soloist and alongside Pescado Rabioso and later Invisible, other acts that performed at Teatro Astral during those years include Manal, Moris, Color Humano, Sui Géneris and Crucis.

[98] Artaud contained a large booklet that also set it apart from other records; it was inspired by medical leaflets, something that has been likened to the album's aim at being a "remedy" to the French poet's writings.

[1] Writing for the Argentine Rolling Stone in 2013, Fernando García considered the "arch-legendary star-shaped cover" to be a work of art, as it "breaks with the function of a design object" and "its geometry slowly pushes the record towards the margin of the useless, the unusable.

[...] For the neurosis of collectors, it is impossible to find an original Artaud cover without worn ends: that challenge to the geometric and industrial patrons (parents)[nb 3] was paid with degradation.

[100] In the early 2010s, the vinyl revival phenomenon reached Argentina and record label Sony Music decided to reissue several sought-after classics of Argentine rock in that format.

Sony Music Argentina president Damián Amanto attributed this to the fact that the rerelease reproduced the record's historical artwork, which had made the original 1973 release one of the most demanded albums by collectors.

Among its fifty respondents were journalists Pipo Lernoud, Miguel Grinberg and Víctor Pintos; and musicians Charly García, Gustavo Cerati, Pappo, León Gieco, Oscar Moro and Litto Nebbia.

[112][113] The album was further revalued over time;[114] and in the 67th number of the Argentine edition of Rolling Stone, issued in October 2003, Oscar Jalil wrote: "Above any revisionism, Artaud is the perfect work of rock culture, loaded with arrows directed to different artistic disciplines.

[116] In the 2017 book Los 138 discos que nadie te recomendó, writers Sergio Coscia and Ernesto Gontrán Castrillón felt that "Cantata de puentes amarillos" "could well be an alternative national anthem".

[121] On January 23, 2020, Google celebrated what would have been Spinetta's 70th birthday with a Doodle which, besides Argentina, appeared in Austria, Bolivia, Bulgaria, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Paraguay, Peru, Spain, Switzerland, Uruguay and Vietnam.