AN unreleased track by rock legends Queen that “no one has ever heard” will be played publicly for the first time today.
Guitarist Sir Brian May, 78, will broadcast Not For Sale (Polar Bear) on radio station Planet Rock.
Sign up for the Showbiz newsletter
Thank you!
An unreleased track by Queen that ‘no one has ever heard’ will be played publicly for the first time todayCredit: RedfernsThe track will be played during Sir Brian May’s Planet Rock Christmas SpecialCredit: Getty
It was originally recorded during the sessions for the band’s 1974 album, Queen II, but did not make the final cut.
This remastered version will feature in the 2026 rerelease of the album.
While a “bootleg” version of the song by May’s pre-Queen band Smile may already have circulated, he says “no one” has heard this version.
It will be played during Sir Brian’s Planet Rock Christmas Special at 6pm — featuring his favourite seasonal tracks.
He said: “It’s a song that goes back a very long way, but to my knowledge no one has ever heard this version.
“It’s a work in progress and will appear on the forthcoming rebuild of the Queen II album.
“But I’m sneaking this into my Planet Rock special because I’m fascinated to know what people think about it.”
Formed in the 1970s, Queen was made up of guitarist Sir Brian, drummer Roger Taylor, late frontman Freddie Mercury and bassist John Deacon.
The group has since had six UK number one singles and 10 UK number one albums with some of their best known songs including Bohemian Rhapsody, Killer Queen, Crazy Little Thing Called Love, and We Are The Champions.
Leon Thomas recently dyed the tips of his signature locs dark green. His new hair color — a stark contrast from the vibrant red he’d been rocking for the last four years — is the first thing that stands out about him when he strolls into the Los Angeles Times building on an unusually rainy day in October.
When asked about his hair, which peeks out from underneath a black beret-style hat, a wide grin stretches across his face.
“I had a vision,” the 32-year-old singer says, leaning in. “In [this] vision, I had more tats, a six pack and I had green dreads. And I was like, ‘You know what, let’s work on it.’” He’s been working out more consistently and he has his eyes set on a couple of tattoo artists in L.A. and Europe, but the new hair kicked everything off.
“That’s how the rest of my life has worked: I’ve seen something in my head, I’ve seen a version of myself that’s not there yet and then you work hard to get there.”
This instinct has carried Thomas throughout his 20-plus-year career in the entertainment industry, and has cleared a path for him to emerge as a leading force in modern R&B music. After years of dedicating his skill to acting, writing and producing chart-topping bangers for artists like Drake, Ariana Grande and SZA (he won his first Grammy for her record “Snooze”), for the first time Thomas is up for six Grammy nominations including album of the year and best new artist for his own work.
“I feel like this is a byproduct of me finally having a machine that works,” Thomas says about his team. He signed to EZMNY, a record label co-founded by Grammy-nominated artist Ty Dolla $ign and A&R executive Shawn Barron, in 2021. He takes an audible breath before continuing, “Not to sound cocky or anything, but I just always felt in my heart of hearts that once people could finally hear what I had to offer, it would be a different story. I’m glad that God gave me the foresight to see that.”
He has good reason to be feeling himself these days. “Mutt,” his breakout 2024 single, quietly simmered for months before it was pushed into ubiquity. The track’s metaphorical meaning — comparing his own flawed behavior in relationships to a “mutt” or a dog with good intentions — along with a sensual bassline and knocking drums eventually became a sleeper hit. It also became a favorite for Tems, SZA, Keke Palmer and Issa Rae, who shouted out the song in interviews.
“That’s how the rest of my life has worked: I’ve seen something in my head, I’ve seen a version of myself that’s not there yet and then you work hard to get there,” said Leon Thomas.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
By early this year, the song, which is the title track from his sophomore album, had cracked the Hot 100 Billboard charts, recently climbing to No. 1 on Billboard’s radio songs chart, earning double platinum status.
The success of the album and the deluxe edition that followed launched Thomas into a whirlwind of promo: radio and podcast stops, interviews galore and after-party appearances. Meanwhile, he’s still made time to make records with other artists like Wale, Disclosure, Odeal and Sasha Keable. He kicked off his “Mutts Don’t Heel” tour in October, and this year alone, he’s had more than 70 performances, including the Hollywood Bowl with Inglewood-born singer SiR, “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and the BET Awards (where he won best new artist). Earlier this year, Thomas stopped by NPR’s Tiny Desk, a live set that has more than 4 million views and has since been turned into an EP. (His Tiny Desk performance also received a Grammy nod for best R&B performance.)
“It’s been nonstop like something great happening every single week,” says Barron, co-founder of EZMNY.
Long before fans were belting out the lyrics “I’m a doggggg / I’m a mutt,” Thomas was getting his first taste of what it takes to be a musician from his family. Thomas’ late grandfather, John Anthony, was an opera singer who starred in the 1976 Broadway production of “Porgy & Bess.” His mother — a singer — and his stepfather — who played guitar for B.B. King — were part of New York’s Black Rock Coalition and “didn’t believe in babysitters,” says the Brooklyn native who now resides in L.A. He has fond memories of doing his homework while his parents were performing and hopping on stage at times to hit a dance move for a packed crowd.
At just 10 years old, Thomas booked the role of Young Simba on Broadway after a family friend encouraged him to audition. He went on to star in more productions, including “Caroline, or Change” and “The Color Purple,” before booking his first film, “August Rush” (starring late actor Robin Williams), which required him to learn to play the guitar. As a result, he began writing his own songs, one of which impressed his parents so much that they booked studio time and a session bass player to help him to lay down the track. “It definitely influenced my perspective on if I could actually make professional music or not,” recalls Thomas, who plays five instruments, including drums (his first love), guitar, bass, piano and saxophone.
“Not to sound cocky or anything, but I just always felt in my heart of hearts that once people could finally hear what I had to offer, it would be a different story. I’m glad that God gave me the foresight to see that,” said Leon Thomas.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
By age 13, Thomas had signed a development deal with Nickelodeon that came with a Columbia Records recording contract. After appearing in various shows like “The Backyardigans” and “iCarly,” he snagged the role of André Harris, a high-school-age singer and multi-instrumentalist, on the tween sitcom “Victorious” alongside star-in-the-making Grande.
When the show ended in 2013, Thomas began working with one of modern music’s most decorated architects, Babyface, who introduced him to producer and songwriter Khris Riddick-Tynes. Together, Thomas and Riddick-Tynes formed the Rascals and began producing records like Rick Ross’ “Gold Roses” featuring Drake (which received a Grammy nomination), “I’d Rather Be Broke” by Toni Braxton and SZA’s “Snooze,” which won best R&B song at the Grammys in 2024.
Still, pivoting from wholesome Nickelodeon star to a grown R&B artist didn’t happen overnight. “The biggest thing for me was just taking time away from the artistry in order to really allow people to celebrate the brand that I had built, but give me room to build something else,” he says. “Space and time can be a tough thing because you’re gonna have to reintroduce yourself even though you did a lot of work in the beginning to build what you had before, but I think it’s beautiful to kind of build a brand from scratch.”
That’s one of the reasons why the cover of his reintroduction project, “Genesis,” features a distorted forest instead of his face. “I didn’t want them to connect with what I was saying, what I was talking about, the feelings [and] the sounds,” he says. With every release, he’s slowly revealed more of himself.
Onstage, Thomas channels the intensity of some of his musical heroes — James Brown, Prince, Jimi Hendrix and D’Angelo. His music may sit comfortably under the R&B umbrella, but he bends and flips genres with ease, especially rock and funk. In TikTok recaps from his current tour, he can be seen ripping on the bass and guitar, whipping his body into turns and effortlessly hitting vocal runs, which fans have attempted to imitate. With him, you never have to question if the mic is on.
“Sometimes I go see R&B artists live and it’s very chill,” he says, but “the school I come from is competitive.” He recalls stories that his stepfather has told him about performing at the Village Underground in New York when he was coming up. “They used to do something called cutting heads, so the first guy would go do his solo, then the guy who came out on the second set had to go even further. He’s playing with his teeth, he’s spinning, he’s on the floor, he’s wildin’,” Thomas says excitedly.
“So I’m in that school of thinking when I hit a stage and for this tour where I get to curate things and really put it together like I want to, there’s gotta be that energy of cutting heads,” he adds.
Just days before launching his 27-city tour, Thomas released a cinematic trailer featuring Rae — who played his neighbor and hookup buddy on “Insecure” — to introduce his latest project, “Pholks.” The seven-track release, created in collaboration with musicians Rob “Freaky Rob” Gueringer and David Phelps, a.k.a. “D. Phelps” (who also worked on “Mutt”), is an homage to the funk, rock and soul artists who’ve inspired him. Led by the singles “Just How You Are” and “My Muse,” which could trigger a “Soul Train” line at any moment, the project feels warm and nostalgic, yet anchored in forward-thinking production and playful storytelling that helps push it into the future.
In April, Ty Dolla $ign brought Thomas out to perform during his headlining set at Coachella, a moment that was a no-brainer for Ty, who recently called Thomas “the new king” of R&B.
“I just can’t even believe that I was the one to be able to do this,” Ty says about working with the singer.
“Sometimes I go see R&B artists live and it’s very chill,” Leon Thomas said, but “the school I come from is competitive.”
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
In the midst of this busy season, Thomas has been more intentional about maintaining his mental health. “I’m doing a lot of grounding meditations,” he says, noting that family and his tight circle of friends have been an essential support system. “I’ve been picking up the Bible a little bit more.”
He also finds steadiness in revisiting wisdom passed down from his late grandfather, who passed away last year, and reflecting on his “why:” bringing a classic, musician-centered energy back to R&B and encouraging young artists to pick up an instrument.
“When a little kid sees me playing guitar on the Grammy stage or if they see me performing on Instagram playing drums, I want them to ask their mom for a guitar or some drum lessons,” he says. With the rise of AI, he says that live musicianship may become less common. “I hope that we can inspire a revolution of intelligence, people who are intelligently making music and coming from a standpoint of history.”
Thomas will close out his whirlwind year with two shows at the Wiltern on Dec. 22 and 23 before embarking on the European leg of his tour in March and heading to Australia in June. In the meantime, he’s trying to avoid thinking about the Grammys in February — though everyone, including myself, is making it impossible for him not to.
Whether he walks away with a golden gramophone or not, Thomas has already created a body of work that has reinvigorated not only R&B but also music in general, and he plans to continue pushing himself creatively. He’s known all along what he’s capable of and the career he’s destined to have because he’s envisioned it. It’s the world that’s had to catch up.
Throughout 2025, De Los has championed the rise of the Latino artists from their respective musical silos and into the broader global pop stratosphere. The 2026 Super Bowl halftime show headliner Bad Bunny and Inland Empire corrido kings Fuerza Regida scaled new commercial and cultural heights this year, as emerging acts like Silvana Estrada, Ela Minus and Netón Vega took exciting new detours in their sounds.
De Los recently did a team huddle to determine our personal best releases of 2025 — this is no garden variety Latin genre list, but a highlight reel of our favorite works by artists from Latin America and the diaspora.
10. Cazzu, “Latinaje” Reeling from a romantic disappointment of mythological proportions and the lackluster reception of her previous album, Argentine trap queen Cazzu fired back with a maximalist travelogue that draws from salsa and cumbia, Argentine folk and electro-pop. Cazzu hails from the province of Jujuy, miles away from the musical snobbery that plagues much of Buenos Aires, and her genuine investment in a pan-Latino idiom is contagious. A sumptuous corrido tumbado about a red dress that went viral (“Dolce”) and an Andean-flavored ode to her daughter (“Inti”) are the emotional cornerstones of an album that refuses to harbor resentment and instead chooses to embrace plurality. Her absence from the main categories in this year’s Latin Grammys was nothing short of criminal. —Ernesto Lechner
9. Netón Vega, “Mi Vida Mi Muerte” As one of música mexicana’s most in-demand songwriters, Netón Vega has crafted hits for every big crossover artist, from Xavi to Peso Pluma. Naturally, it’s about time that he delivered a full-length project of his own. Vega’s debut album, “Mi Vida Mi Muerte,” takes stock of the current sound of corridos tumbados and pushes it to its limits alongside the very collaborators that he helped top the charts. Vega’s chameleonic qualities as a songwriter allow him to bend the rules of what counts as “Mexican” music, and over 21 songs, he establishes that his vision includes Californian G-funk, blissed-out boom bap and even Caribbean reggaeton. Vega sounds equally as comfortable on the radio smash “Loco” as he does wailing over a bajo sexto, proving that the future of corridos, with him at the helm, can be more expansive than ever before. —Reanna Cruz
8. Juana Aguirre, “Anónimo” If the music business thing doesn’t quite pan out for Juana Aguirre, Argentina’s newly anointed resident genius could find success as a film director — such is the palpable cinematic gravity of “Anónimo,” a stark masterpiece of digital mood conjuring. Aguirre builds her tracks slowly, armed with an unerring instinct for beauty and a ruthless, try-and-discard methodology. The results are childlike at times — parts of “La Noche” and “Lo_Divino” sound like nursery rhymes — while the nakedness of “Volvieron” brims with a solemn, ageless kind of grace. Her sonic spectrum is panoramic, from esoteric folktronica murmurs and camouflaged industrial noise to the cosmic stillness of “Un Nombre Propio” and the ritualistic piano of “Las Ramas.” Until “Anónimo,” the Argentine avant-garde had never sounded so intoxicatingly sensuous. —E.L.
7. Adrian Quesada, “Boleros Psicodélicos II” At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, multi-instrumentalist and producer Adrian Quesada enlisted some of the most enthralling vocalists in Latin music to record “Boleros Psicodélicos,” a love letter to Latin American psychedelic ballads from the ’60s and ’70s. The album, which featured original compositions alongside kaleidoscopic covers of the genre, was hailed as an instant classic after its 2022 release. Three years later, Quesada improved upon the winning formula by actually being in the same room as his collaborators — the first album was made in isolation. “There’s a little bit more life, energy to some of the songs,” Quesada told De Los of “Boleros Psicodélicos II.” That vibrancy is certainly felt in tracks like “Bravo” — Puerto Rican singer iLe’s voice is laced with plenty of venom to do justice to Luis Demetrio’s spiteful lyrics (“Te odio tanto / Que yo misma me espanto / De mi forma de odiar”) — and “Primos,” which has Quesada pair up with guitar vibemasters Hermanos Gutiérrez for the album’s only instrumental track. Here’s hoping that we get another installment of this brilliant series three years from now. —Fidel Martinez
6. Nick León, “A Tropical Entropy” Hailing from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., just a hop, skip and a jump north of Miami, the electronic mixmaster Nick León broke through a busy pop music landscape this year as a producer with a distinctly Floridian point of view. In his latest album, “A Tropical Entropy” — the title harks back to a phrase from Joan Didion’s 1987 book, “Miami” — León crafted his moody “beach noir” sound by blanketing his dynamic assemblages of dembow, dancehall and other Afro-Caribbean rhythms with a foamy, oceanic ambience that flows and hisses throughout the record. Featuring the vocal talents of Ela Minus (“Ghost Orchid”), Erika De Casier (“Bikini”) and Esty (“Millennium Freak” with Mediopicky), it’s an audible feast for club kids whose afters entail collapsing on the sand and watching dolphins traverse the horizon at sunrise. —Suzy Exposito
5. Not For Radio, “Melt” Released in October, “Melt” is the frosty solo album by María Zardoya, lead singer of Grammy-nominated L.A. band the Marías, who wrote and recorded 10 of her most soul-baring songs yet during a haunted winter sabbatical in the Catskills. Imbued with brooding elements of chamber pop à la Beach House, Broadcast and the Carpenters, there is much enchantment to be found in the details of Zardoya’s electric drama; like how the warm fuzz of an organ meets frosty chimes on opening track “Puddles,” or in the restless, skittish pulse of “Swan.” Zardoya’s yearning for a love lost crescendoes, and is most devastating, in the piano ballad “Back to You”; but it seems as though even her darkest, most melancholic moments are touched by the fae. —S.E.
4. Isabella Lovestory, “Vanity” With 2022’s “Amor Hardcore,” Isabella Lovestory established herself as a neoperreo princess — the Ivy Queen for the Instagram era. The Honduran pop star’s follow-up album “Vanity” takes a different approach, trading sleazy sexcapades for campy vulnerability. As in her name, Lovestory is inherently a storyteller. Her lyrics are pulled from half-remembered dreams, speaking of herself in immersive, surreal contradiction. She’s a perfume bottle made of foam, or a strawberry made of metal. It’s a deceptively saccharine world, one that she sees as, in her words, a “poisonous lollipop.” And when the production falls somewhere between RedOne productions and Plan B deep cuts, that world becomes a post-cultural, hazy pop dystopia of both the past and a far-off, distant future. —R.C.
3. Fuerza Regida “111XPantia” In summer 2024, while promoting the band’s previous album, “Pero No Te Enamores,” Fuerza Regida frontman Jesús Ortiz Paz assured me that the San Bernardino quintet was not abandoning the sound that made it one of the biggest acts in the música mexicana space. Simply put, JOP was scratching a creative itch by flirting with Jersey club, drill and house music. True to his word, the charchetas and tololoche are now back and on full display in “111xPantia.” Yet the band’s 9th studio album is by no means a rehash of their past work; Fuerza Regida is as experimental as ever, whether by incorporating a banjo on “Peliculeando” (what’s next, a collab with Mumford & Sons?) or sampling Nino Rota’s iconic theme song on “GodFather” (given the focus on excess, the lyrics are more Tony Montana than Michael Corleone). This year, JOP & Co. set a new benchmark for the ever-evolving genre, all while becoming the biggest band in the world; Fuerza Regida was notably the only non-solo act to crack Spotify’s end-of-year top global artist list. —F.M.
2. Silvana Estrada, “Vendrán Suaves Lluvias” Estrada’s second full-length album is a musical masterclass in maintaining serenity through loss. With her head held high, the Latin Grammy-winning Mexican singer-songwriter soldiered through an extended period of grief to write “Vendrán Suaves Lluvias,” including a harrowing heartbreak and the shocking murder of a friend. The bones of songs like “Como Un Pájaro” and “Un Rayo de Luz” are folk ballads, which she initially wrote using her trusty cuatro; but with the mighty backing of an orchestra, Estrada’s compositions swell with a symphonic grandeur that bolster the songbird’s more empowered and optimistic stance in the face of disappointment. “¿Cuál еra la idea de aventartе sin dejarte caer? Qué manera tan desoladora de querer,” she sings with an arid, jazzy inflection on “Dime” — a plea to a half-hearted lover who cowers at the force of her integrity. —S.E.
1. Bad Bunny, “Debí Tirar Mas Fotós” “Debí Tirar Mas Fotós” has managed to dominate conversation all year — from its No. 1 debut in January to this summer’s blockbuster residency and subsequent world tour. Much has been said already about Bad Bunny’s magnum opus; the album is a generation-spanning, full-throated celebration of boricua resilience, and simultaneously a pointed warning about the ongoing neocolonization of La Isla del Encanto. But perhaps, in the spirit of its title, its best function is as a series of timeless musical snapshots: There’s the sweeping voice of the jíbaro calling down from the mountains on “Lo Que Le Pasó A Hawaii.” Sweat from rum-soaked nights in Brickell and La Placita lingers on “Voy a LLevarte Pa PR” and “Eoo.” Hands fold together on “Weltita” as waves ebb and flow, and the warmth of a grandparent’s final forehead kiss lingers on “DTMF.” It’s a record that is designed to be intimately understood by Latinos, with Bad Bunny’s personal ethos of Puerto Rican independence managing to build a bridge between the island and those displaced from it. And with Benito’s Super Bowl victory lap right around the corner, “Debí Tirar Mas Fotós” is poised to dominate not just 2025, but the coming months as well, cementing him as — to paraphrase “Nuevayol” — el rey de pop, reggaetón y dembow.
Honorable mentions:
Reanna’s pick: Corridos Ketamina, “Corridos Ketamina” There’s one night at the start of every Los Angeles autumn when you can begin to feel the chill of loneliness in the air. When I heard “V-Neno,” the opening track on Corridos Ketamina’s self-titled debut EP, I was taken back to the first time I felt it: walking around at 3 AM alone and moody as hell. The 14-minute EP is like if Lil Peep and Lil Tracy went down to Sinaloa for the weekend. Triple-tracked vocals drenched in reverb drift over sluggish guitar loops, all struggling to claw out of the K-hole. Yes, technically Corridos Ketamina are making narcocorridos (what you see is what you get: in an interview with the Fader, they put it simply, “Let’s make the first corrido about doing K”), but there’s something still warm and inviting at the core of these seven songs. Maybe it’s the familiar blend of emo, rap, shoegaze and corridos — or it’s the fact that this is a record that could only come out of Los Angeles, born out of late nights on empty freeways and in seedy apartments. —R.C.
Ernesto’s pick: Amor Elefante, “Amigas” I dare you not to smile when you listen to “Hipnótico,” the synth-pop fantasia that kicks off “Amigas,” a welcome return to action for Buenos Aires quartet Amor Elefante. The band moves in the fertile periphery where sunshine pop meets dream rock, channeling the Police on the reggae vibe of “Universal Hit” and diving into Cocteau Twins ether on “La Vuelta.” If anything, “Amigas” illustrates the band’s bloom as composers of potential singles: drummer Rocío Fernández goes funky on the folk-driven “La Vuelta,” while keyboardist Inés Copertino flexes her disco diva status on the outro line to “Foto de una Coreografía.” In lead singer Rocío Bernardiner, Amor boasts one of South America’s most radiant voices. —E.L.
Suzy’s pick: Ela Minus, “Día” Born in Bogotá, Colombia, and now based in Brooklyn, electronic artist-producer Gabriela Jimeno, or Ela Minus, first bonded with beats as a tween drummer in a hardcore band. That rugged punk rock intensity would later unify the vast, synth-laden sprawl that is her second album, “Día”: a chronicle of her displacement during the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent ego death. She lets her listeners in with the vulnerable yet galvanizing dance track “I Want to Be Better,” which she has described as her “only love song” — but icily calls for the world’s end on the Latin Grammy-nominated club cut “QQQQ,” and rejects the parasocial worship of pop stars in “Idols,” chanting: “Chasing after phantoms / Bowing down to someone else’s idols.” Indeed — how embarrassing! —S.E.
Fidel’s pick: Cuco, “Ridin’” Hawthorne’s own Cuco (real name Omar Banos) tapped into the soundtrack of Southern California’s lowrider culture — soul and R&B — to make “Ridin’” one of the best neo-Chicano soul albums in recent years. Tracks like “My 45” and “ICNBYH” (“I Could Never Break Your Heart”) are perfect accompaniments for slow drives down Whittier Boulevard. “Para Ti,” the only Spanish song on the LP, sounds like it could come out of one of your abuelo’s bolero albums. —F.M.
According to Humbe, it doesn’t matter how bad his day is going — a pink sunset can change everything.
As a kid growing up in the Mexican metropolis of Monterrey, the singer-songwriter would seek out the sky’s strangest shapes and study the way light broke through the cloud formations — it would comfort his anxieties and provide creative inspiration. So, when he set out to finish his most recent LP, “Dueño del Cielo,” released on Saturday, he found himself in one of the few places where the sun never truly sets: Iceland in the summertime.
“I envision this album as this planet of ashes. So, I wanted to go into that state, be lonely and create the inner dialogue heard on the album,” said the singer of his sixth album.
Humbe has been playing music from a young age, but he first rose to fame during the pandemic, sharing snippets of his music-making process online. Following the release of his breakout debut album in 2021, “Entropía,” the alternative pop singer earned a Latin Grammy for new artist and has since become well-known for his 2023 single “Fantasmas.” The track honors his late grandpa for Día de los Muertos and tends to go viral each year around the holiday.
“Dueño del Cielo” is the final installment of a trilogy, following 2023’s “Esencia” and 2024’s “Armagedón.” Nearly every track on the latest release signals transformation, in both its lyricism and its sonics. On the opening song, “Luz de Luna,” he gushes about not wanting to miss someone over a heartfelt piano ballad that slips between punky guitar rifts and unpredictable 808 drums. While on tracks like “Harry Stamper” and “Sábanas,” he embraces whimsical synthesizers and staccato vocal patterns to create a mystical soundscape.
On a recent promo trip to Los Angeles, De Los caught up with the 25-year-old Latin alternative pop singer in the days before the release of “Dueño del Cielo.” Humbe will be embarking on his first-ever U.S. tour next year, and will play at the Wiltern on April 9.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
“Dueño del Cielo” is out in a few days. How are you feeling about its release? It’s surreal. I’ve been working on it for five years, so I can’t believe it. I started writing it at the beginning of the pandemic. The first song was the title track, and it was a song that embodied so much in me. It’s a rebirth and a moment of growth. “Dueño del Cielo” generally represents resurrection. I’ve always been so attached to my current version. I always think, if I like who I am right now, I will want to stick to it and never change. That’s when frustration comes.
This album taught me that change is part of life in the best way possible.
This album is also the final installment in a series, following “Esencia” and “Armagedón.” When did you realize you had a trilogy on your hands? It feels like the universe spoke it [into existence] in a way. Sometimes things can’t only be coincidences. I realized all three albums were meant to be a trilogy, because they are all albums that essentially celebrate life.
“Esencia” is an album that celebrates the essence of one’s self. “Armagedón” represents how someone or something like a relationship or an addiction can change your whole essence. At first, it can seem just like a shooting star, but then you realize it’s a f— asteroid that’s gonna kill you. Then “Dueño del Cielo” is me finding and regaining that essence. It’s about realizing that from the ashes you can still be born.
What was going on in your life when figuring out how to end this series? I’ve been searching for inner happiness. I can’t even think about a specific situation, because it’s honestly just a whole bunch of things that just make one’s glass full. I was just sick of everything. I was falling in a depression state without seeking out motivation.
But I realized that everything was due to me trying to find something that maybe wasn’t lost. I realized that life is about reinvention. It’s about deconstruction and reconstruction. That’s what I’ve been doing, and I will keep doing.
A portion of this upcoming album was made in a remote Icelandic town. When did Iceland come into the picture? My brother, his girlfriend and I were in a sushi bar in Mexico City. We came to the realization that we are young and that we have free will. We figured I’ve been working on this album for five years, and haven’t finished it because we’ve been so distracted with everything else. So, why not take advantage of the fact that we are young, that none of us have kids, that we can travel and that it’s about to be summer in Iceland?
We bought the tickets at the sushi bar and left. It was crazy. We went for a month and a half. It was summer, so there was no darkness — only pure daylight. The darkest it got was blue hours. Living there was so poetic and beautiful.
I envision this album as this planet of ashes. So, I wanted to go into that state, be lonely and create the inner dialogue heard on the album. The album’s perspective changed so much there. It became so versatile.
How do you feel you changed as a musician in Iceland? I got so much more sensitive towards everything. I gained so much perspective on how live instruments change a song. I used to work a lot with plug-ins and sound libraries. But this time, everything was recorded live.
After Iceland, we recorded everything in Miami. We were able to do the album in 10 days. Then, for the next three months, I kept finding small details to fix, even though I knew I was done. I had such a hard time letting it go that my mom had to tell me to stop.
At what point in the process did your mom have to step in? I uploaded the album on my way to the sound check. Even on the day of my listening party in Mexico, I was still making changes to the album. That’s when my mom and the mixing engineer told me that it was time to let it go.
She didn’t say it before, so I guess it wasn’t done up until that very moment.
There are 22 tracks on this album, making it your longest project to date. Did you always know this was going to be a lengthy record? I always wanted to do a long project. I’ve had it on my mind since I was a kid. I wanted to do something like Aerosmith or Queen when they would release those long a— projects that belonged to a concept, back when artists used to create concepts and create universes. That’s what I admired about artists, their ability to invite me somewhere in their fictional world.
What kind of world do you think you’re inviting people into? I’m inviting them to the sky. Since I was a kid, that’s been a constant in my life. I’ve always been hypnotized by the sky, by the light and how light works with the clouds. Now I am actually in awe every time I see a pink sky or see a nice pair of clouds. It sounds stupid, but you really could have a s— day and end it with a beautiful sunset. It could all change the way you feel.
Were there any sunsets you witnessed while making the album that influenced its sonic direction? There was this time in Iceland, when I was writing “Murallas.” It was so weird, because the weather was so foggy and it felt like we were in a cloud all day, but mid-session, it cleared up out of nowhere. It eventually became a beautiful sunset that lasted four hours. “Murallas” is such a sad song, and I couldn’t keep writing about something so sad when it was so beautiful outside. So, we stopped working on it and went outside to enjoy.
You started this three-album journey years ago. Now, after finishing its last installment, how do you think making this music has changed you? I’m a more excited person about everything. I’ve refound a child in me that I thought I’d lost in a way. I really thought he was gone, and I found him again. I feel much more at peace today. It’s so clear to me now that everything changes all the time. That is something this album taught me: I’m ready for anything.
