101 songs, albums, video submitted this week
Antes de Ti, video/single by Silvana Estrada & pablopablo. I really love this song. It is a spare, stripped-down bolero that just focuses on the voices. What I really love is the concept – don’t think about life before each other, it meant nothing. The song is mostly guitar and the two voices, but it builds slowly, adding symphonic touches and then sliding back to the voices. A brilliant piece of songwriting and composition that blends jazz, folk, and traditional Latin American music in a subtle bolero love song. Spanish. Stream everywhere.
Ojos Tristes. single by Selena Gomez, Benny Blanco, and the Marias. A dreamy, bilingual journey built around a sample of Jeanette’s 1981 ballad “El Muchacho de los Ojos Tristes” — a beloved song in Spanish. The song moves with a hazy, dreamlike, disco-influenced glow — nostalgic but contemporary. The production is atmospheric with soft synthesizers, warm reverb, and a slow-burning tempo that lets the bilingual vocals breathe. It feels like a Marias’ song with Maria Zardoya’s voice and the band’s signature hypnotic indie sound carrying much of the emotional weight. Spanish and English. Stream everywhere.
Goodbye, single by Arthur Hanlon, Carlos Vives & Goyo. A rocking good time. It’s “cumbia blues” — a fusion of two African-diaspora traditions: the blues of the Mississippi Delta and the cumbia of Colombia’s Caribbean coast. Arthur Hanlon’s piano grabs your gut while your feet are moving to bossa nova, cha-cha-cha, and vallenato, and Goyo’s rap blows you away. So much fun. Spanish with a few English words snuck in. Stream on all major platforms.
All I Can Say, single by Kal Uchis. The Colombian-American Uchis reaches back to the American 1950s with doo-wop harmonies, blues-style guitar chords, and a vintage organ that conjures a Sunday afternoon in a midcentury high school gym. Uchis evokes Sam Cooke as she slow-dances you with a percussion-free soft background, and “ooh-ooh-oohs” and “do-do-do-dos” floating beneath her lead vocals like a ghost choir. The track opens with a gentle wordless hum, and the outro dissolves into pure scat syllables — “la-da-da-da-da”, but in the middle she has more to say than just hold me tight on the dance floor: “No, I’m not sorry for the way that I am / I’m not sorry for the way that I love or the heart that I have / No, I’m not sorry for the dreams that I dream / Or the life that I live ’cause it all belongs to me”. English. Stream on all major platforms.
Berghain, single by Rosalia. Wow, this has to be one of the most ambitious pieces of music out there. “Berghain” features Björk and experimental musician Yves Tumor, with the London Symphony Orchestra in what can only be called a tri-lingual symphonic goth-pop acid trip. The song moves through German, Spanish, and English — three languages, each assigned to a different voice and emotional register. It is structured in 4 movements, with Vivaldi-like strings, soaring choir, and f-word inserts. It is too large to comprehend in one listen, so grab your earphones, elevate your consciousness, hit Repeat, and lean back for an extended musical trip through Heaven and Hades. English, Spanish, German. Stream everywhere.
Lo Vas Olvdar, single by Billie Eilish with Roslia. Released in 2021, the song was created for HBO’s Euphoria special episode “Part Two: Jules”. It was Eilish’s first foray into Spanish – she insisted on Spanish (with some English) – and her first colab with another female singer, Rosalia There is no drum track, no rhythm section, just layered, reverb-heavy synths hovering like fog, slow piano chords emerging intermittently, and a bridge built entirely on wordless vocal sighs: “Ay, ay / Ay, ay, ay, ah-ah”. A masterpiece that has stood the test of time. Bi-lingual. Stream on major platforms.
Patrick O’Heffernan
banner: Rosalia and Billie Eilish, YouTube
