VALENTINA FEL, VALENTINA FEL
Independiente, Chile ****
Rating: 89
By Carlos Reyes
Valentina Fel is like a hyperbole of music’s very own fetishism; her powerful funky voice literally devours any beat coming her way, it’s erotic, wacky, fascinating, and at the end, very pleasurable. Valentina Fel sounds gigantic; it’s the realm of pop on the verge of detonation. Valentina treats music as the vein that projects her own wisdom. In this sense, her approach is almost cynical to pop’s customs. Very rarely do we get such a defying authorship in pop music, she can hardly contain the vernacular strength of her voice, lyrics and volatile background treatment, it’s weird but she overreaches themes like folk artists squeeze their socially-minded subjects. In better words, Super45 calls her “the most logical evolution of a riot girl.”
Bouncy disco-ready platforms await her sky-scraping voice, every song is a confrontation, and almost every song is a triumph. The opening track and lead single “Sin Control Mi Diversion” proposes a contract, to let things go on and off as they please, to have fun without attachment. Of course it’s hard to not be attached to something, especially on an age of new media, and that’s where Valentina raises the bar, she dislocates sound as daring as she makes up new words to sew a dance tune. Hint, don’t let the lyrics dictate a song, have them be part of the process, if you want to experiment, forget about bytes and transitions, learn angles. Lyrically, “Acapulco” may not make sense at all, but you’ll feel the furious and quite violent loom in which she demoralizes power.
“Circo Podrido” is directly confrontational, “perdiendo la batalla, te invito a jugar, mover mi ritmo, ritmo que rima esta maldito… ja jaja jaa.” It may seem like she’s throwing a bunch of concepts into the air with no real coherence, but just like Santigold, Valentina’s music travels in waves, you can see such beautiful formation with Windows Media Player’s ‘Ocean Mist.’ She’s one of those personas that would suck at commanding experiments (because of the lack of technique), but a genius in brainstorm. She makes high-voltage pieces like “Alteracion” and “Take Me Home” sound effortless, also giving up tempo in “Loco Vagando” and “No Me Quiero Anular.”
Valentina’s aesthetics are best exemplified in “Las Estrellas”, the most playful and ultimately adolescent track in the album: “ya no voy a recurrir a la niñez perdida, ya no voy a recurrir a la bebe dormida.” In the song, she also makes a reference to military stars, “hoy las estrellas dicen algo yo lo escucho, son tan deprimentes dicen todo en tu escudo, mira las estrellas, mira calaveras.” What an awesome way to ridiculize the war and use imagery to condemn it. In terms of sound, we have been exposed to this synth pop through Javiera Mena and Maria Daniela y Su Sonido Lasser (maybe even Jessy Bulbo), but none with this resonance and focus on the actual dance floor. Valentina’s has crafted a vogue manifestation of the new popstar. Valentina Fel is at this moment only available in Chile, New York’s Lizard King will be releasing her first broad material next year, one of our most anticipated albums for sure.