At 20-years-old, Alyssa Lourdiz Cantu (professionally known by her stage name, Lourdiz), holds a resume that has already generated lots of buzz. She’s been featured on now-viral hits like “Back Seat” by Saweetie, racked songwriting credits for tracks with artists like Anitta and G-Eazy, and has provided background vocals on a recording for Celine Dion. Most recently, the singer-songwriter joined the freshman class of SoundCloud’s artist accelerator program, “First on SoundCloud,” which took off earlier this year.
Lourdiz (who currently resides in Los Angeles) hails from San Antonio, Texas, though she’s called more than one place in the Lone Star state home. “When I was young, I moved around a lot,” she tells Remezcla. “I grew up in San Antonio, in the city, and then I went to the outskirts…like what people would consider the country. I [also] lived in Austin for a while. It was pretty cool getting to be in all these places in Texas… The way people dress is all different, the way people talk is different. Getting to see all that, it definitely made me who I am and it made me think maybe me not being in the same place growing up was actually dope.”
One can immediately pick up on that mashup of different aesthetics and phraseology in songs like “Somersault.” Its video is just niche enough to resonate with Tejanos far and wide, but overall, it’s still accessible to larger audiences. You can catch Lourdiz pairing streetwear with her finest ridgetop hat, and donning thigh-high vaquera-style boots while bouncing along to the sticky bass kicks, singing “Diamonds do the cumbia/Looking like the lights on me/Why you so necio?/Flipping like somersaults.” But you’ll also find nods to the lowrider subculture and traces of Spanglish scattered throughout her lyrics. The local elotero even makes a brief appearance. No small detail disappears into the background. Instead, it all serves as an important kind representation of where she comes from. “I grew up around people wearing cowboy hats and people listening to Tejano music. It’s definitely going to come out and show up in what I do,” she states.
“I grew up around people wearing cowboy hats and people listening to Tejano music. It’s definitely going to come out and show up in what I do.”
The allure of pursuing a music career as a solo artist in Hollywood (where she’s lived for the last few years) reels in aspirations from all over the world, but Lourdiz notes that songwriting has been a fulfilling path as well. “Growing up, you wanna be an artist, a superstar, all this crazy shit, and then you learn that there’s also plenty of [other] things you can do, like write for other people,” she says. “T-Pain was a songwriter but also an artist. Pharell, Missy Elliott, those people showed me that. But I feel like everybody is an artist regardless of whether we sing our own music or write for other people.”
However, she’s also now ready to kick it into high gear and hone in on her own catalog of material. In her latest single “Get Along,” Lourdiz teams up with dancehall heavyweight Shenseea to detail that turning point where a relationship starts to go sour and it seems like neither of you can just get it right. It’s cloaked in soft pop stylings and is a departure from the upfront swagger found in “Somersault,” but the song puts Lourdiz’s vocal stylings and versatility in the limelight, as she belts out the hard to resist hook that’s bound to live in your head for days to come: “Why can’t we/ Get along, get along, get along/It’s fucking up my life and/It’s all that’s on my mind.”
As far as what’s to come in the near future, Lourdiz says we can expect more music (“It’s something fun and up-tempo,” she teases), plus her cameo in a feature-length narrative film that documents the experiences of all artists and musicians in the “First on SoundCloud” lineup. She’s ready for whatever is headed her way, she assures. “It’s a journey in life, just like any other job. You never know what’s coming. You’ve just gotta believe in yourself, believe in the process, and have fun.”
