After three years of courtship (some more since they met), Rosalía and Rauw Alejandro have transferred their sentimental relationship to music for general revelry. The collaboration between the two had become a recurring demand for the couple’s fans, already undoubtedly one of the most popular in the music industry. And, after the runrun, this has happened, with care, personality and brilliance. No one thought of a three-song EP for their first collaboration, like – tad! – the just released ‘RR’ (Sony Music). All the songs will also have their own video clip.
The cover of the work -“personal good”, in the words of Rauw Alejandro- are two opposite and intertwined R’s. The love, the relationship, the initial fervor and the promised future make up this project that has been cooked up for the last year. An EP, by the way, that the couple has confessed that their first idea was to publish it on 3/3/23 (because of the three years of courtship, the three songs…). “But the masters never arrived,” said the Puerto Rican in a direct on Instagram and TikTok in which they have shown the songs to his followers. And they have launched that they will present them “soon out there live”.
The tender project is made up of three different and independent pieces that somehow fit together and narrate a journey. For those who already know Rosalía, the work of the Catalan in production and her determination to find points of union between different sonorities becomes evident. Nor is he from Puerto Rico a man who walks the flat path of reggaeton, far from it, but rather he seems comfortable experimenting in search of a new pop galaxy. But, in reference to the production (Noah Goldstein and Dylan Patrice accompany them in the credits), Rauw Alejandro himself explained in an interview that he gave in to the creative dialogue with the Catalan, always stubborn and perfectionist. The letters, yes, are born from each one and from each one they are.
Next, we break down the ‘RR’ EP.
one kiss’
The unstoppable attraction, with the universal gesture of the kiss, and the blissful distance in couples with a tendency to be nomads cement the first song on the EP (titled, of course, ‘Kiss’), from which they advanced a few seconds a few days ago to create expectation. “I always love when you arrive; and I hate when you leave”, they confess in part of the catchy chorus. The keys of a stringed instrument start a piece that at times threatens to be more danceable than it ends up being.
2) ‘Vampires’
Related news
Rauw Alejando enters proclaiming messages reinforced by the echo effect, a resource already known by the Puerto Rican, while the basses are rising. He announces what is, in his own words, a “galactic, ‘hardcore’ and metallic dog.” And, the truth is that one understands the definition seconds after playing the song. Especially when the percussion appears in stages announcing that yes, the chorus is coming, and yes, the perreo is coming. “We have the street turned on; we go out at night, we arrive during the day”, they say in a dialogue that they maintain throughout the song, which also has its ‘hardcore’ moments when some second voices become diabolical. It is not, therefore, a sweetened reggaeton, it is dark and overwhelming. A party without looking back (perhaps like the one they had weeks ago in the Apolo room, judging by some images).
3) ‘Promise’
‘Promise’ is perhaps the most passionately romantic song on the EP, a blinding track that looks to the future with optimism. Like any couple who imagines making the most vulgar and absurd plans with an incessant smile. “I want to eat cherries with you; climb all the mountains”, are examples verbalized by the one from Sant Esteve Sesrovires. Or, as Rosalía sings in a brilliant verse: “I want to dress badly; and undress a lot”. It is a beautiful bolero led by the irreplaceable bongos that are mixed with precise electronic arrangements that increase as the song progresses. And in which Rosalía’s voice stands out above all else (despite Rauw Alejandro’s notable exercise). It is noteworthy how both voices come together throughout the EP, and each song with different registers.