The second single from Blue Electric Light is called human and it is a look of Lenny Kravitz to what it means to belong to this species. The lyrics of the song begin by saying: “When the days of trying to please everyone are over, I will finally have begun.”
““One should give oneself enough space to be who one really is.”, reflects Kravitz. “You should allow yourself to be the person you are. I have lived my life like this, but it is not always easy. “There is so much pressure on how we should be, what we should be, from the moment we are born.”
Kravitz, an exceptional multi-instrumentalist from New York, winner of 4 Grammy Awards, has defined alternative rock with a voracious curiosity for funk, soul and electronica. That syncretism has been his professional flag. The freedom with which he has approached his career has built bridges between genres, in times when rock could not leave its important place in pop culture. That has made him unique and authentic, two words that the music industry persecutes and abhors with equal intensity.
At 59 years old, Lenny Kravitz releases his twelfth full-length album Blue Electric Light, and in this conversation he seems physically frozen in time. The musician, actor and photographer – among many other passions that have accompanied him since he saw the Jackson 5 play as a child at Madison Square Garden – has just received a star on the Walk of Fame, a public choice award, released a song with the renowned electronic DJ Peggy Gou, was nominated for the Hall of Fame of Rock and Roll and the Golden Globe award for his song Road To Freedom For the movie Rustin. Your video TK421 broke the internet in November, where he is seen as God brought him into the world, unleashing an interesting viral wave of desire and passion.
Kravitz jumped off the stage to soak up the joy of his fans.
Photo:Juan Diego Buitrago/ EL TIEMPO
I have lived my life like this, but it is not always easy. There is so much pressure on how we should be, what we should be, from the moment we are born.
During the delivery of the star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, his daughter, actress Zoe Kravitz, had some time to make a couple of jokes about her dad. The joke, which went viral like his multiple appearances in recent months at awards shows, catwalks and other public events, referred to a transparent black fabric shirt – sometimes mesh – through which one of the torsos can be seen. most coveted of the last three decades. The garment, a constant favorite of the last 20 years in the musician’s trousseau, is “the only stable relationship you have had in your life,” her daughter tells him sarcastically.
And this is important because when Lenny turns on the camera to do this interview, he’s wearing that shirt that Zoe is talking about; Over it is a leather jacket. She wears dark hexagonal glasses and the dreadlocks with which we first saw him in the videos of It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Overy Always On The Runfrom his album Mama Said of 1991.
Kravitz is excited about this new job because it takes him back to his youth, before fame. Before starting the talk, he remembers his presentation in Bogotá.
“I had a great time there, and I really want to return. I wish I had more time when I was there, to hang out. I actually arrived early and did some rehearsals before the tour. I was able to see a little and meet some people, but Colombia is a place where I want to spend a good time.”
“And for those of us who have followed him since Let Love Rule “It was really satisfying to see him play,” I reply.
“Thank you very much, man,” he tells me.
It is a sensual, sexual, spiritual album, and it is a bit of the album that I never released when I was a teenager. Which is interesting, because when I released my first album, that was the beginning of my sound.
Let’s talk about ‘Blue Electric Light’. Tell me everything you can, but let’s start with the name.
It is a feeling of energy, of God, of love, of light, of power. These are some of the elements. It’s a very fun album. I had a great time in the studio making it, recording it in the Bahamas, at that time when the world stopped (the Covid-19 pandemic). It is a sensual, sexual, spiritual album, and it is a bit of the album that I never released when I was a teenager. Which is interesting, because when I released my first album, that was the beginning of my sound. I had all this information dump that I put into Let Love Rule and I never looked back. What he was doing before that first album is more or less what you hear on this new album. There are actually two songs on this album that I wrote in high school.
That’s very interesting because you would think that as you evolve and grow as a musician, if you look back at those early songs, you would feel that they are too naive, innocent.
And they actually are, in a way. Getting that back is beautiful. That was exactly what I thought. Could it be that he is going to be very youthful, very naive? But I needed to cool off. I needed to give myself permission to return to that adolescence.
What are those two songs from adolescence that appear on this album?
Bundle Of Joy and Heaven. But I want to know his opinion about the album.”
Well, in general, what has always happened to me with his catalog: that they are very personal songs and that somehow end up reflecting those feelings of his, but in very different ways. And that’s why I also want to ask him about his musical relationship with guitarist Craig Ross, which is, in my opinion, one of the most fruitful in the history of the past three decades of rock.
Thank you, thank you for saying that, because it’s true. Craig is a gift that God gave me, an exceptional being. And he deserves those flowers. I give it to them every day, but it’s nice that someone else recognizes it.
“I just released a new album,” I told him. And Craig said, “Yes. “I already know everything.” He picked up a guitar and played me the whole album perfectly. Since that day, we have not been separated. That was in 1991. Craig and I have shared our entire lives until 2024.
How did you meet?
We met at a pool hall in Los Angeles. A very large billiard room. I think it was called The Hollywood Athletic Club. I was hanging out there with a friend from high school, and Kathy Valentina, the bassist for The Go-Go’s, approached me. I had met her when she was a young boy making demos for the A & M Records label. How did she remember me? I have no idea, because I hadn’t seen her since then, and also my stage name at the time was Romeo Blue. I had just finished the tour Let Love Rule, and she congratulated me on the album and asked me if I needed a guitarist. I replied, “Actually, yes.” I was organizing a group to go on tour with the new album, Mama Said. She pointed to a nearby table. “Do you see that guy with the big hair?” she asked me. “That’s your new guitarist,” she said. I asked him, “Really?” Kathy was dating Blondie drummer Clem Burke, Craig was living with them and was in a band called Broken Homes, who had put out a couple of albums and were touring with them, but he wasn’t really satisfied there. Mama Said He had come out a couple of weeks ago and after introducing me to him, we went home and grabbed two guitars. “I just released a new album,” I told him. And Craig said, “Yes. “I already know everything.” He picked up a guitar and played me the whole album perfectly. Since that day, we have not been separated. That was in 1991. Craig and I have shared our entire lives until 2024.
That story is beautiful and it shows in every note and in every song they have released since then. Incredible and magical.
Craig is my right hand man. We don’t have to say much. He just passes by. In life and in music. He has been the engineer on the last two albums and plays guitar on some songs, he has become an amazing engineer. I’m very proud of him.
I put it all together with the analog gear that you know I love and use frequently, along with some of the effects I used during that era. All of that helped me gain authenticity. Lots of eighties technology.
You have always been a fan of analog, but in the late nineties you explored digital. Is this album a mix of that?
Yeah. Because I was recreating some of the vibes I felt as a teenager, I pulled out the drum machines, the 808, the DMX, the old drum kits too, my old synth, a lot of great keyboards. I put it all together with the analog gear that you know I love and use frequently, along with some of the effects I used during that era. All of that helped me gain authenticity. Lots of eighties technology.
Tell me about the video for the song ‘TK 421’. That video broke the internet in November when it came out.
I can’t take credit for the video because it wasn’t my idea. I had seen a video of Rosalía. I adore Rosalía. She seems to me to be an exceptional artist. I had seen the video of her Chicken Teriyaki. I said: I want to work with that director. It turned out that she was a young filmmaker from Ukraine called Tanu Muino, and you know that my grandfather is from there. That seemed attractive to me. I sent him the song and asked him, what do we do? He told me, “we have to do something that only you can do, in your environment, in your vibration, nothing invented.” I asked him: “well, like what?”, and he answered: “we are going to go to your house, you are going to wake up, get ready for your day, take a shower, put on your clothes and you are going to go out into the street.” It seemed like the most boring idea in the world to me. But she knew very little of his plans. He came home with his team and told me: “take off your clothes, get into bed and let’s start your day.” I said, “ok.” And we had a lot of fun because it’s a very ironic video because we didn’t take that filming very seriously. We were fooling around and having fun. And, well…, it worked. She edited it herself. It was all her idea, and like you say… we broke the internet.
AUTHOR: ALEJANDRO MARÍN
FOR THE TIME
@themusicpimp
Listen to the podcast
Listen to Alejandro Marin on the Bilingual Podcast on Spotify and on Apple Podcasts and on La X, Más Música, and watch it on Canal Trece every Monday at 10 pm
