‘Motomami’ assails you without preamble: line of reggaeton basses with a sinister aftertaste and spectacular rhythmic tension, via an ‘avantgarde’ jazz interlude. With popular drive and innovative edge.
Rosalía, foul-mouthed, aggressive, warns anyone who might expect a full continuation of ‘El mal Quiero’: “I am very much mine / I transform myself / A butterfly / I transform myself ”. Snip to everything that is left over and limits: “fuck the style & rdquor ;.
The Afro-Latin voice ‘saoco’ (flavor, rhythm, joy), slips a nod to the theme of Daddy Yankee and Wisin in 2004.
‘Candy’
Reggaeton, yes, with layers of cosmic keyboards and an introduction between sensual and liturgical, with r’n’b reliefs, wrapping a lyric in which Rosalía tells us about a sentimental meltdown, substituting melancholy for a languid bad grape: “I no longer I remember your face / The shape of your body even if I thought about it & rdquor ;.
‘Fame’
What was the first ‘single’ from the album is a sinuous bachata that speaks to us about the celebrity with distant skepticism.
Rosalía, snake charmer at the bonfire of the vanities, sharing verses with The Weeknd.
Seductive artifact in which, in addition to nine authors, eight other producers are involved, from the recovered El Guincho to the ubiquitous Puerto Rican Tainy.
‘Bulerias’
The most flamenco track, paying homage to ‘La Niña de Fuego’, a zambra by Quintero, León and Quiroga that Manolo Caracol made his own.
Other explicit (and transversal) mentions: Niña Pastori, José Mercé, Lil’ Kim, Tego Calderón and MIA Poderío jondo, with jaleo and ‘autotune’, cooked with Chiqui de la Línea, Rosalía’s teacher at ESMUC.
‘teriyaki chicken’
Japanese-style chicken, as a pretext for a reggaeton toy number ready for Tik Tok, with its pounding chorus and its choreography with feline mimicry.
Two minutes and two seconds of cascading puns (‘teriyaki’, ‘maki’, ‘Kawasaki’), put together to entertain, simple and crude, with a funny intonation with a snarl (although it may well be the theme that produces the most haters) .
The groom, Rauw Alejandro, is among the seven co-authors.
‘hentai’
It begins as a ballad with an air of the old American standard and ends with bursts of electronic shrapnel.
A sweet Rosalía sings enraptured by rough sex, marrying the verb ‘fuck’ with God and spouting very plastic rhymes (“in love with your pistol / red poppy”).
Warm but disruptive, it sends one of the many signals to Japanese culture: the word ‘hentai’ (‘perversion’), alludes to pornography in manga and anime.
‘sponge cake’
A rambunctious copy, with a catchy and childish hum, and a dry and ‘minimal’ electronic complexion, in which she nonchalantly releases declarations of principles: “I didn’t base my career on having ‘hits’ / I have ‘hits’ because I laid the bases & rdquor ;, raps sticking out his chest. Song included in the soundtrack of the PlayStation video game ‘Gran Turismo 7’.
‘G3 N15’
New break: here, in the form of a vulnerable monologue about his long stay in Los Angeles, in times of pandemic, far from his family.
I sing over an organ mantle open to urban pinches, warm and purifying, which leads to a voice note from her grandmother in Catalan, where she highlights the importance of God and family, and encourages her to continue in that “ món molt complicat” of the music profession.
‘motomi’
The spirit of the album, condensed in a minute of lyrical ‘patchwork’ (rhyming ‘tatami’ with ‘tsunami’, ‘origami’ and ‘sashimi’) on a rhythmic electronic irrigation with a subtle touch of jazz and a resulting set of onomatopoeic hooks.
The ‘motomami’ looks haughtily at the imitations: “To each copy you see / You give it your blessing / I do not want to compete / if there is no comparison & rdquor ;.
‘Devil’
Flamenco cante appears again, making good friends with the Latin cadence, marrying the melisma with the processed voice, with a robotic and infantilized touch, in a piece that advances towards a ghostly atmosphere, with features of the floating electronics of James Blake, co-author of the part.
Notes on success, money and spirituality: “The bullet of God plays in roulette / You have not watched, your purity has gone & rdquor ;.
‘Delusions of greatness’
Fame, once again in the spotlight, in this somewhat uptempo revision of the Cuban bolero by Carlos Querol (1920-91), which Justo Betancourt recorded in 1968. Rosalía, in tropical diva mode, with lush orchestra , points to the one who allowed himself to be blinded by gold.
Latin lounge classicism that, in its final stretch, welcomes interferences via ‘sample’ from ‘Delirious’ with rapping from Soulja Boy.
‘Cuuuuuuuute’
One of the most abrupt tracks, with high-octane bass and a monochord turbo-chorus (“keep it cute, manito, keep it cute”) in dry contrast with the balsamic twist on account of the “butterflies loose on the street”, which “To see them you have to go out & rdquor ;.
A piece with a radical cut, the furthest from any notion of the ‘mainstream’, again touched by mysticism: “that here the best artist is God”.
‘Like a G’
At the opposite pole, this introspective atmospheric sequence on which Rosalía pours out her sentimental tribulations.
No canonical ballads: the meaningful piano song (played by James Blake) leads to a background murmur over which his voice mutates and merges with the machine until invoking innocence with a childlike hum. Delicate engineering work.
‘abcdefg’
It is not a song, but the recitation of the ‘Motomami alphabet’. ‘Sketch’ with which Rosalía places us in her imaginary: the A “for alpha, height, alien & rdquor ;, the B for “bandit & rdquor ;, the C for “coquette & rdquor; & mldr; Artificial intelligence occupies the I, and Willie Colón, the W, and the Z is “for blackberry, or for zapateao, or for fox too & rdquor ;.
‘The Versace Combo’
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‘Sakura’
If ‘Saoko’ opened the album with bravado, ‘Sakura’ closes it like a song to fragility, symbolically going to the cherry tree in blossom (meaning of the song’s title in Japanese) to remind us out loud that “being a popstar / you never hard & rdquor ;. Song that tackles like an old copla, recovering flamenco diction on a matte keyboard base. Vocal brilliance as the last sign, between canned applause a little parodic, as if coming out of a stadium, from a Rosalía aware of the tragic condition of the artist and who warns of the possibility of breaking.