When you listen to Julieta Venegas’ most recent album, Los Momentos, you hear the track “Vuelve,” which features some heavyweight names in the Latino game, Café Tacvba’s Rubén Albarrán and Chilean femcee Anita Tijoux. The track’s vocals clash, since you have Julieta’s airiness mixed with Rubén’s raspy croon and Anita’s clear assertiveness. Not to say it’s an ineffective clash, it works to a degree.
Julieta has now remade the track with some of Chile’s cool kids, Javiera Mena (our girlfriend) and Gepe (our boyfriend). The alliteration in their names isn’t the only thing that works sonically in this rendition. There’s a well-balanced subtlety in each of their voices. No one is outsinging anyone. No one is overdoing it. Julieta sounds like Julieta, twee yet affected; Javiera is allowed to flex her vocal maturity; and Gepe brings some much-needed male vulnerability to the track.
A superior version? Yes. But only because their voices align so well. It’s like I want to hang out with the original version of “Vuelve,” but I want to make out with this version of “Vuelve.” See the difference?
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Download Julieta Venegas’ Los Momentos below: