Rosalía Vila is a name I can guarantee you will be seeing much more of very soon. She has done more to fuse the geographic and generational musical styles of Spain for the rest of the world than any other artist in recent history, all while carving out her own unique brand, in both the sound and visuals of her music and its videos. With her second album dropping in early November, Rosalía is not one to sleep on.

Hailing from just west of Barcelona, the artist knows what it means to have a disparate background; recall the struggle Catalonia has always had with expressing its national identity against the Castilian zeitgeist of central-northern Spain. Flamenco is an iconic piece of Spanish culture, but having originated in the southwestern city of Sevilla, it’s historically as foreign to Catalonia as Irish river dancing is to the average U.S. citizen. Nevertheless, Rosalía grabs hold of a genre exotic even to herself and ties it to modern rhythms and choreography of hip-hop and R&B almost effortlessly.

Vila had her professional start in 2016 by being featured with other large contemporary artists, namely on the reggaetón hit “Antes de morirme” / “Before I Die” and the early-2010s-Drake-esque “Llámame más tarde” / “Call Me Later” by one C. Tangana, whose own forte lies in the up-and-coming genre of Spanish trap. She held her ground on tracks with an already-established personality, and audiences soon realized that her talents extended far beyond a catchy hook.

Growing into her own, Rosalía debuted her first album “Los Ángeles” / “Angels” in early 2017, along with neo-flamenco singles such as “Aunque es de noche” / “Even Though It Is By Night” and “De plata” / “Of Silver,” pairing her magnificent vocal power with only a classical Spanish finger-picked guitar and, of course, the iconic firecracker claps of flamenco, like Lana del Rey on steroids.

Now catapulted into the mainstream, her second project, “El Mal Querer” / “The Bad Wanting” promises to be multitudes more complex in both form and performance than anything the Catalonian has done previously. Divided into chapters like the novel it will surely be, the album is an anthropology of a romantic relationship, with each song exploring a separate emotional state — “Éxtasis” / “Ecstasy”, “Disputa” / “Dispute”, and “Lamento” / “Lamentation” to name a few. The 11-track journey will drop Nov. 2.

The 25-year-old’s true expertise as an artist comes from her ability to not only perform and embody discrete spheres of culture as though they were her own, but also fuse those spheres together almost seamlessly into something novel. She has adopted Andalusian flamenco undertones and woven them into her modern choreography and melodies, like in her single “Malamente (Cap.1: Augurio)” / “Badly (Chapter 1: Omen),”where she makes reference to the gypsy culture that is so present in the south of the peninsula. She bottles the same lightning in “Pienso en tu mirá (Cap.3: Celos)” / “I Think Of Your Gaze (Chapter 3: Jealousy),” incorporating subdued American-influenced trap beats and even light adlibs before the chorus into her smooth and firm vocals. She’s a marvel, and you will hear of her again very soon.

 

Tristan Donahoe, a Contributing Writer for the Voice, can be reached for comment at TDonahoe20@wooster.edu.