Breathe deeply, drop the needle or hit play, close your eyes, throw yourself in, feel on the surface, savor every moment and keep breathing. “All life, one day” (23), a musical journey through the passage of time and the marks that the flavors and troubles of everyday life leave on our skin and soul; a journey through each vital phase, unique and essential, beginnings and endings united by a new rebirth. A whole life, a complete and infinite circular cycle in 69 minutes, chaotic and ordered in 21 songs, divided into 5 movements, reflections of each stage, with different sounds, tastes, smells, textures and colors, each with its light, search and private adventure. A vindication of the beauty and richness of each moment, from childhood to old age, passing through the effervescence of youth, maturity and adulthood. Yes, this is an immense, overwhelming work, both in form and substance, one of those few albums that comes close to being a miracle from the first listen, transmitting the vertigo of creating and living in equal parts. Grooves in which you enter and exit (if you can) differently.
Possessing what is perhaps the most beautiful, versatile and free voice of the last two decades, we are accustomed to Silvia Perez Cruz give us extra lives with each new installment, in studio and live, always bordering on excellence naturally and with an open heart. From the essential solo debut “November 11th” (12), before and after that he marked with “Granada” (14), together with Raül Fernández Miró, going through the heartbreaking and hopeful “Domus” (16), film soundtrack “Near your house” which earned him the Goya for Best Original Song; then came the delicious “Evening Dress” (17), accompanied by a string quintet, until reaching her eclectic, chameleon-like and multicolored penultimate “Farce (impossible genre)” (20), where the songs danced with poetry, acted with the cinema and throbbed in the theater. In addition to this studio album-winning repertoire under her name, she was co-founder and soloist from 2004 to 2011 of Las Migas, with whom she recorded “Reinas del matute” (10), and has collaborated with countless national and international artists from a Endless styles and different artistic genres, traveling halfway around the world and always leaving a mark in their wake. Among many other qualities, for “her unwavering commitment to beauty”, she received the 2022 National Award for Current Music. And now, after three years of preparation, she reappears with her most ambitious work to date. date, “All life, one day”a disc that “born from solitude with the will to unite solitudes”, produced by herself and in which more than 90 musicians have participated. Songs created from the intimacy of the pandemic and completed over a slow fire around the world, from Cuba to Uruguay, from Barcelona to Iceland or Mexico, “without waiting for you, without waiting”, with the soul in the sun, singing to the rain and the wind .
The eternal return of living to feel and sing it in five movements that reflect the cycles of life, each one with its own color and self-love. This marvelous vital tale begins with the “First move”, he“yellow circle” (first four songs), representing the light of the “Childhood”, where the security and calm of the home reign. Thus we let ourselves be carried away by the aromas and clean energy of the flowers and the sun rays in the garden, rocking ourselves in a phase in which harmony, enjoyment and innocence reign, holding on, so that the bright days do not end. of a summer that we relive and crave. The desire to share… songs composed during confinement as birthday gifts for friends.
“Terrified, looking for a familiar flower to shelter in, and the vastness of the field makes him afraid of it”.
From the comfortable breeze that rocks us in “He doesn’t want the world to end”going through the delicate beauty of that spring love postponed for summer in “Dragons are looking for April”both with luscious string arrangements and heavenly choruses, like a celebration of friendship and mutual care in “Planets and swallows”Without forget “The flower” central, beautiful and blinding metaphor of the fragility and strength of life that takes your breath away. Of those tragic, painful and unfair moments lived intimately, confined, in the distance, to the radiant blossoming: “…one day that spring without a smile and / with a muzzle, without mass and funeral / without a fraternal hug, they closed the curtain, / filled another plane, toasted to the absence / of education, / wiping their hands / they regrow the summers more than that flower”.
“Blue Circle” (next five songs), “Second Movement” and we enter the sea of “The Immensity”in the flight, search and constant transformation of “youth” (from 20 years to 40). She storms and calms at every blink. The most experimental and daring movement, with wind instruments, thousand textures and effects, synthesizers and autotunes included, with Silvia adapting verses from other poets for the occasion. “Terrified / they look for a familiar flower where they can take refuge, / and they are frightened / by the immensity of the field”. We begin the blue furrows ordering the immensity with the help of the omnipresent flowers and people who love us, with the brilliant poem by William Carlos Williams as a substrate for the dreamy and resplendent darkness of “terrified”; with Silvia’s voice floating, fragmenting and duplicating in a misty atmosphere that surrounds us until we catch air in the silence and, suddenly, a chorus throws that calm and shelter that the verses ask for. The Uruguayan poet Idea Vilariño lends two poems for the following two tracks: “Sin”with Silvia’s singing gravitating in outer space between four saxophones (one hers): “No up, no down, no beginning, no end. / Without east, without west, without sides or sides and without center”. followed by “Dirty”, with Silvia’s voice from the other side of the glass, contemplating the sky and this time accompanied by a keyboard and wind instruments: “To look up to the abysmal mystery of the stars, which will surely be something as dirty, as petty and as dirty as this”. Fernando Pessoa, “The poet is a pretender” and perhaps the most electronic and experimental song of the lot, with Silvia’s processed voice, more spatial than ever, but without losing a bit, on the contrary, oozing roots among the stars and a certain copler aroma. Let’s get out of the immensity of the “blue Circle”but we will no longer be the same, we are going to “come out differently”, eight monumental flamenco minutes, very Morentian, full of nooks and nuances, with Silvia wasting quejío and intergalactic polka dots, “taking off” along with the maestro Pepe Habichuela on guitar, the beat of Carles Benavent’s bass and, at the end of the Martian fiesta, that tenant of the world and sidereal junk dealer brimming with Jerez compás, Diego Carrasco rules. And no, I am not forgetting the great Carmen Linares and that broken jondura that shrinks the soul and stops time. As Enrique Morente said, and Carmen sings in this jewel, “Go out different”: “We are alive by a miracle.”
“Third Movement” and three songs, the “Green Circle” “My garden”, that of Silvia (from 40 to 60 years old), revisiting the main poem by William Carlos Williams as an overture, “terrified”, this time stripped of all instrumentation, with an Italian chorus of male voices as protagonists. And personally choosing each care, each flower, each person, winter approaches with two beautiful shared pieces, naked and sung face to face: the generosity and humility of asking “Help (Martin)”, together with Juan Quintero and, in that blossoming of self-love, of rediscovering and caring for oneself under a calm and comforting maturity, the also beautiful “My last sad song”together with Natalia Lafourcade, where Silvia sings for the first time in décimas (also in “Em moro”).
He “Fourth Movement”he “black circle” (from the age of 60 until death), it smells of wood and wisdom. “The weight”, the simplicity and awareness of the whole of life, of stopping, looking back and continuing to be moved, spreading hugs and kindness at every step. Again three songs and guest artists: The crepuscular beauty of the titular theme, “All life, one day”, together with the heartfelt and overwhelming singing of Liliana Herrero, the tragic sobriety and throbbing solemnity of “All the ends of the world“, with some very careful string arrangements, and the exciting “I live”with Salvador Sobrall and Silvia Perez Cruz planting flowers and love before dying momentarily, merging and weaving another immortal song with their vocal cords.
We come from dying and in the “Fifth Movement” we celebrate the “Renaissance”the lively heartbeat of “Red circle”. Joy sprouts and transforms, after the cold, warm blood flows to the sound of vibrant spring, childbirth and a new beginning. The percussion and the voices mark the essence of these last six tracks. Of the tambourine that beats and the songs that come together so that everything flourishes in “Spring 21”, to the percussive metal strum that awakens the day and the healing hammond of a “Intro” that blends with the sound and spiritual richness of “Stars and Roots”, with Maru and Rita Payés adding happy hearts and new dawns together with Silvia, under a starry sky of roots turned into a song that does not let us touch the ground.
With a poetic introduction by the playwright Pablo Messiez, we continue to explore “the most beautiful imperfection” of living, now exploring the limitations and advantages of language in “Naming is impossible”with Cuban musicians, choirs and a magic flute that unleash the gentle swaying of the waves, spotting other horizons and kissing the Malecón in Havana as they come and go.
The placidity of the lullaby of winter sun in “Your name” rocks us and leads to the end and beginning of everything, with a “Dish” what “wait with a bouquet of flowers chosen especially for you” and, just as we begin, she says goodbye reciting in French and embracing us with pure maternal love and future refuge, making out the first circle again and crossing a magical atmosphere that welcomes us before we meet: “I don’t know you yet but I love you”.
Breathe deeply, drop the needle or hit play, close your eyes, throw yourself in, feel on the surface, savor every moment and keep breathing. “All life, one day.”