MEXICO CITY (AP) — A deep feeling of gratitude for songs that have accompanied Draco Rosa “through thick and thin” motivated the Puerto Rican star to create his most recent album of covers of rock classics in Spanish “Reflejos de lo eternal”.
“I think that for the composer it is important, it is the legacy and celebration of a good song, a good song can be recorded by 10, 15, 20 artists and last a lifetime, there are so many genres, there are a thousand ways to do it,” he said in interview by video call from Puerto Rico.
Draco Rosa grew up listening to rock and soul, and mentioned Aretha Franklin, the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix as creators of great covers.
For his album he made a prior selection of 60 songs that he wanted to record, of which eight remained. He experimented by avoiding using too much electric guitar to get closer to drum and bass to which he added retro keyboards.
“I love being able to play so much good music,” he said. “Hopefully I can record all 60 of them in my remaining life.”
One of his favorites is “Eres” by the Mexican Café Tacvba.
“That topic for me is a religious experience. For me the topic was always a very spiritual thing,” she said.
The album also has “Kumbala” by Maldita Vecindad y los Hijos del Quinto Patio and “La Negra Tomasa” by Caifanes, which in turn is a version of the original song by Cuban author Guillermo Rodríguez Fiffe.
The “Reflections of the eternal” also refer to great musicians who are no longer with us, such as Pau Donés from Jarabe de Palo, who included “La Flaca” or Gustavo Cerati from Soda Stereo, whom he remembers with “En remolinos”.
“Sometimes I have thought that I did not make the necessary efforts to connect with many people, I missed the opportunity to meet, to share, not for lack of invitation,” said Draco Rosa when asked about his relationship with these musicians. “Simply because back then I was not very social and I never wanted to bother… It has not been my strong point, no, but love is there and I think it is a way for me to celebrate it.”
The album is completed by “Me gustas tú” by Manu Chao, “Padre Nuestro” by the Fabulosos Cadillacs and “Sindocumentos” by Los Rodríguez, the latter was a song for which he took a different path by removing the drums after a moment of introspection in the mountains. The overall result of the album has a psychedelic sound that refers to the 1960s.
“I have always said ‘music is not to be understood, it is to be felt,’” he said. “You can say it’s psychedelia, and I understand you, but in my mind there is nothing psychedelia, it’s a natural flow. I think there is an authenticity within a moment, everything is done live, it flows that way. Psychedelia is nice because there is a liberation within that fragrance.”
Since his beginnings in Menudo in the 1980s, Draco Rosa celebrates four decades of experience in 2024 in which he has been awarded four Latin Grammys and one Grammy. “That’s for a book,” he said about the entire journey.
The anniversary finds him in the studio recording unreleased songs, with his coffee farm in Puerto Rico, eager to perform live after the pandemic and at a time of great changes.
“I got divorced, and I mention it because there is a personal rebirth and a huge desire in this phase of my life to record more,” he said.
“How exciting to know that there is a rebirth and to be there, even if it is at the end of the queue of that, I love it, I feel that rebirth that is not mine, but that of everyone, I feel that with all the chaos that is happening I think that There is a nice movement, musically speaking, I think something emerges, something very nice is cooking because we have had some strange years.”
