“[‘Someone’] has a deliberately sluggish beat punctuated by sticky, squishy clavinet notes, while the vocal line makes jazzy leaps that sound increasingly distraught. By the time the bridge suddenly swells and he reiterates, ‘I needed you/I don’t know what to do,’ it’s already obvious.” — The New York Times
“Gabriel Garzón-Montano revels in a slow-drip of funk on ‘Someone’…” — Rolling Stone
Gabriel Garzón-Montano is pleased to announce his new album, Agüita, out October 2nd on Jagjaguwar in association with Stones Throw, and today shares the album’s title track and accompanying video directed by Art Camp. Agüita, his first release for Jagjaguwar, follows 2017’s Jardin, Garzón-Montano’s acclaimed debut full-length melding classical and folkloric instruments with R&B, hip-hop, and cumbia, and 2014’s Bishouné: Alma Del Huila, the critically-lauded, self-produced EP that put Garzón-Montano on the map, its tracks serving as sample fodder for a handful of popular music’s most iconic artists.
Agüita is a sequence of impossibly diverse offerings ranging from trap anthems to string-drenched art pop ballads – a prismatic self-portrait, personal and universal all at once. Garzón-Montano’s ability to execute a wide range of musical styles is his secret weapon – and so it is no wonder he bristles at the prospect of settling into any one genre. “Genre has never been a consideration,” he says. “The idea of genre uses fear of failure as a baseline. Genre puts the music in a box. This album is anti-genre. Anti-fear. Anti-box.” What remains is an ultra-personal journey through the three separate characters that constitute Garzón-Montano’s personality: the debonair leading man, the wistful impressionist, and the Latino Urbano hitmaker.
In this life, a first-generation American, born in Brooklyn to French and Colombian parents, can marry 808s with 19th-century art song, and catch a million plays in a weekend. In this life, old school analog tape and autotuned, varispeeded androgyny live together in perfect harmony, and the algorithm meant to guide us to our next playlist is of no use. In this life, big brujo energy means blunts and 3 inch heels; it means Apollonia’s hands around you from the back of that motorcycle; it means nueva cancion, and reggaeton; it means the rabid, joyful individualism of funk – of oneness – of the one. (Yeah, in this life – you’re on your own.)
The magic of Agüita lives in Gabriel’s ability to consolidate a range of truths into a focused, crystallized idea. On the title track, Garzón-Montano delves into club-banger territory, performing in Spanish for the first time on record. Like early single, “Someone,” the artist previewed “Agüita” in a stunning session for COLORS earlier this year.
Whether you’re here for the medium, or for the message, for the man himself, or one of his characters, Agüita stands as the strongest installment thus far in a series of alarmingly sincere, sensationally profound works, from an artist who has sought not only to challenge established preconceptions and categories, but to expose their ultimate unworthiness. From composition to execution, the product distills the essence of Garzón-Montano’s genius, an uninterrupted creative process rare in this age of fattened album credits.
Agüita Tracklist
- Tombs
- With A Smile
- Muñeca
- Fields
- Mira My Look
- Moonless
- Someone
- Bloom
- Agüita
- Blue Dot
Watch Video For “Someone”-
Watch Gabriel Garzón-Montano’s COLORS Session –
