Photos: CubaSi
Talking with Francis Del Río is a party. Have you seen him on stage? Well, likewise, spontaneous, without mincing words, brazenly sincere and restless, lucid, clearer than water in what he thinks and in love, absolutely in love with the words he pronounces, as with women, life and art. .
Does my description sound like a mess? It is, because I try to present a Cubanazo from the soul to laughter, and that’s what we are, right?: a tasty and essential ajiaco. Likewise, mixed and versatile, is his creative vocation:
«The first thing I did was theater with my mother when I was a boy, then I was a painter all my life, that is, it can be said that I am a painter who sings, not a singer who paints. Plastic will always be in my art, in my extravagant way of dressing. The visual world will always be mixed with my work. In fact, one thing I enjoy more than painting and singing is when I do all of that while editing videos. It is a medium where I channel all my creative potential».
-What are the reasons that inspire you?
—Lately, I am very influenced by Instagram, because it is a tremendous festival of feminine beauty and I am very sensitive to the image, I see the charms that it has beyond the erotic part, because my work does not really need any woman to sell it , but they are really such beautiful images, when women do these plastic actions with costumes, for example, fashions, I like it and I identify with it and I am happy when I create through it. Sometimes I put on music that they don’t even expect, imagine a Japanese woman who is practicing Tai chi chuan, and suddenly you put on a timba behind her… but hey, it’s a very rich contrast.
Tell us about the music. What is Francis Del Rio up to?
“This time has been hard for everyone. About a year ago I made a record called prodigious decade which to me are nice, very smooth, club-like songs, based on the timbre of that time. Those songs were very beautiful and not because of the musical accompaniment. The musical accompaniment was, if it can be said, poor, but the melodies were pretty, like children, who are born pretty and then with what you see them they look pretty. That album seems to me to be quite in that style. I have it saved and I would like to release it with a Cuban label. For the rest, we are with Interactive in the Bertolt Brecht rock, that gets rich there.
You are very active on social media. You already mentioned Instagram, but also on Facebook. How have you been in this time of so many attacks and lynchings, especially against Cuban artists?
—Look, almost all the problems of human beings are emotional and affective inconsistencies, especially in the family, and spiritual or love failures. It is my humble opinion, I do not want to offend anyone, but whenever I see someone in that negative wave, especially with politics and that, I see them more as patients, as sick, because if you have a beautiful girlfriend and everything goes well and you are fulfilled in your art, that does not concern you. It’s like a fashion that exists: talking about politics. It seems that everyone has their president complex, some more than others; those who have taken it seriously, well…, but there is only one president, there are not two, not three, not four. In the case of artists, it does bother me that they make that emphasis to attract attention: using politics, using the name of a president, that is, you can go through that, but there are other issues, that is a very mediatic way to attract attention. Secondly, it is a sick state that you do not realize when you are already with the virus that is growing on you, because you catch it with it and you enter a cycle that you cannot get out of. I don’t share that and they get aggressive. I don’t like to block and I’ve had to block a lot of people because of it.
«Everyone thinks as they please and believes in the system they want to believe in and nothing is perfect. I speak well of Cuba because I live in Cuba. I don’t live in Italy, or Miami, or Hong Kong. I live here and what I know, the process where I grew up was in this; How little or how much I am I owe to this.
“I say what I really think. If I make a song for Maceo, it’s because I download Maceo. I’m not inventing to show off with anyone, or to get a car; everyone knows that I don’t even have a bicycle. I do it because I really download him ».
—And you have received personal attacks for expressing those things you feel. How do you handle it?
-I told you that I no longer see it as bad or good, I see it as sick or not sick people, because really the problem of none of the artists is that Díaz-Canel is there or is not there. Our problem is not that. Ah, if you want to focus on that and grab her with that to attract attention, right away if you’re a painter, your work will go up in price; if you are a singer, your music will go up in price. It seems to me that it is a manipulation or it is a bad taste.
—The most recent thing has been the entire boycott of the San Remo…
-It’s always the same. There will be that fire with Cuba constantly. People don’t forgive you if things go well for you, they gouge out an eye for seeing you with one eye too… (as I say in a song).
—Francis, I am going to tell you three words and I want you to answer me very quickly and very briefly what each one means to you.
-Interactive:
-Fusion.
—Jaruco:
– Maternal home.
-Cuba:
-Me.
