The Journey That Led Juanes to His Best Album Yet — and The Wisdom that Came With It

T
hroughout history, many experts have studied the dichotomy that seems to exist between fear and love. It’s easy to think about that when examining Juanes’ career: First, there was the innocence and passion of the Colombian star’s Ekhymosis era and his first years as a solo artist. Then came outstanding success, a deep bond with an enormous audience, and–this is quite logical – intense pressures over time. P.A.R.C.E., for example, was a record landed far from the expectations of audiences and the media, who were used to hits like “Fijate Bien,” “A Dios le Pido,” “La Camisa Negra,” “Me Enamora,” or “Es Por Ti.”

“When P.A.R.C.E. came out, I was going through a very dark period of my life, mainly in the creative side,” he said at the time.

One of the biggest clichés in music journalism is when any artist gets asked which album they value the most or least in their discography. The answer is almost always the same: Their records are like their children, it’s too difficult to pick one because they love them all equally, blah blah blah. However, those questions are easy for Juanes: Without hesitation, he picks P.A.R.C.E. as one of his least favorites. “I think it’s my worst record,” he confesses. “It’s definitely an average record. I was in the dirt. I was very depressed. I smoked a lot. I drank a lot. I was broken. For two years, I held on to something that was killing me,” he says.

That process led him to a point where he felt he hit rock bottom. While playing a show in Washington, he thought he couldn’t take it anymore. It was excruciating to think about how much he had struggled to get to that point and to feel the need to give it all up. The touring, the responsibilities, and the commitments of fame had long distanced him from his path and people, a period of his life that he now compares to driving in a Formula One prize without entering the pits. Success was taking its toll.

And although he didn’t like P.A.R.C.E. in terms of recording, production, and performance, Juanes doesn’t believe in misses in art. Creatively speaking, everything is valid for him: “I think that helps you define and clarify your creation’s character and what you want to do in the future. It gradually refines, and that’s necessary,” he acknowledges. The big difference is that someone like Juanes -or any of his peers- is required, to an extent, to give it a try and miss in front of millions of people.

For him, the problem isn’t making mistakes — but losing your essence. He smiles while remembering that, recently, on Santiago Alarcón’s podcast (Meterse al Rancho), he said that he felt “artistically distorted, doing shit and horrible music” at one point. An artist needs a lot of character to admit something like that in front of a microphone. Juanes believes that the peace of mind required to say such a thing comes with time and that he probably wouldn’t have put it like that before. Still, those reality checks have been lessons, and they’ve allowed him to get to his latest album, Vida Cotidiana, which he considers the best of his career.

The visibility Juanes that achieved in that first decade of the century became a platform for his activism for peace in Colombia. Alongside other major artists in the country, he carried out the massive Paz Sin Fronteras concerts in 2008. It was a sincere and honest move, but they say no good deed goes unpunished, and the first “haters” appeared, and he’s still baffled about the things he had to read on Twitter. Being as polarized as it was amid the conflict with FARC at the time, Colombia claimed victims everywhere.

Loco de Amor arrived in 2014. Despite being an album with high-end production alongside the likes of Steven Lillywhite (U2), Emmanuel ‘Meme’ del Real (Café Tacvba), and Paul McCartney’s drummer, Abe Laboriel, his songs went rather unnoticed in the big markets.

For the second half of the last decade, with the staggering force of urban music, the trends and pressures became overwhelming for many artists who decided to venture into these roads. That’s when Juanes made Mis Planes Son Amarte (2017), and Más Futuro Que Pasado (2019). The creative and production process for these records didn’t always come naturally to him. “That wasn’t my usual way of working my music, with my guitar, recording in a studio with other musicians,” he admits.

Juanes takes his hat off to the talent of producers like Sky Rompiendo, Tainy, and Mosty, who worked with him on these records, but he explains that their way of making music with machines, beats, and samples is completely different from his. “I said: ‘What am I doing here? I mean, is this what I’m supposed to be doing?’ But at the same time, I wanted to give myself room to experience it,” he confesses before clarifying that “that’s the context in which I felt uncomfortable.”

Moreover, he recognizes that he ended up feeling he had reached his limit and didn’t want to expand his exploration into urban pop, deciding instead to turn inward and try a process he calls “growing up into your childhood.”

That sense of freedom is something that came through strongly when he made Origen (2021). It was an album in which he tried to rediscover many of his roots through the music of people like Carlos Gardel, Fito Páez, Juan Luis Guerra, Kraken, and Bob Marley. Origen wasn’t the first stop on that quest: In mid-2019, Juanes performed at Rock al Parque, making headlines for a huge turnout and his version of “Seek & Destroy” by Metallica, a band for which he professes the adoration of a true fan. A few months later, Juanes was chosen as the Latin Recording Academy’s Person of the Year and received the award from Lars Ulrich in one of the most emotional moments of the Colombian artist’s career. “You’re one of the reasons I make music. You changed my life. Thank you,” Juanes told Ulrich in front of the audience in Las Vegas.

Recently, as part of this story and amid the release of Metallica’s 72 Seasons, Juanes texted me on WhatsApp: “No matter what they say, that new Metallica album is a masterpiece for me.”

A few months after his performance at Rock al Parque, the pandemic hit. By that point, Origen was almost finished. Then came the social explosion, and critics came after him again for anything, directly intimidating people who developed projects with the artist in Colombia. It was in this context that his covers album helped him take action and say: “I’m going to go out on a limb here and keep defending my guitar and everything that rock has been to me, the mix with Caribbean elements and all these things I do.”

“I’m not looking for a million likes,” he told Rolling Stone En Español as part of the promotion for Origen and went further: “I’m not expecting, nor thinking really, if the radio is going to play the songs. Let whoever wants to listen to it, whoever it might be.” It is clear that time has helped him lose his fear and to better manage his expectations of “success.” “If you have very high expectations, you’re going to suffer a lot,” he says. “Who do you compare yourself with today to consider yourself successful? Bad Bunny or one of these ultra-mega giants, because they make the music that young people listen to today?”

Although Juanes has no trouble calling out the album he appreciates the least among all his records, it is also very easy for him to say that Vida Cotidiana is his best album. The Colombian artist assures that on this occasion, there are no expectations. “I made the record I wanted to make. I’d sit and listen to it over and over again, and I’d say, ‘I love this.’ I can safely say this is 100 percent me.”

Once again, love is the main character of this record, but it goes beyond romantic love, exploring his relationships with his country, family, and different aspects of life. The track “Vida Cotidiana” talks about his bond with Luna, his eldest daughter; “Mayo” and “Canción Desaparecida” (featuring Mabiland) are about Colombia’s harsh socio-political reality. Juanes estimates that 70 percent of his songs can be misinterpreted. They probably talk about a particular type of relationship, but the media and public end up believing they talk about romantic love.

There are moments when Vida Cotidiana feels like an act of revenge, with hard-hitting sounds and strong drums, as if he wanted to get away from certain production resources. “I think the sound of the album is pretty much what the Americans call ‘in your face,’” and insists that rock always needs some anger. That search was part of the work done with the Argentine Sebastian Krys (Shakira, Alejandro Sanz, Kinky, La Santa Cecilia, Elvis Costello) in the album’s production.

The album’s message has a lot to do with the price he’s had to pay to have this career, which often means he’s not been able to spend time with his children, wife, and family. He’s missed school performances, meeting, even important family celebrations. “Sometimes, when I get home and look at some of the pictures there, I’m nowhere to be seen. I’ve always been traveling,” he says gloomily, and claims that it still is quite strange for him to finish a concert and go back to an empty hotel room to watch a movie or answer some emails.

And he knows the album tracks won’t reach the top of the charts. They have no chance against major pop genres, but they weren’t meant to be commercial blockbusters. None of that worries him. “The music I’m making right now is not Number One on the charts because people are listening to something else,” he says with complete certainty and tranquility. “The meaning of success is about personal fulfillment for me, what you do. You don’t necessarily have to be famous. It’s about doing what you like, enjoying the moment and your work.”

Turning to his age — he’ll turn 51 in a few weeks — he believes that time has given him “access to more knowledge, the opportunity to learn more and open more doors that might’ve been closed before. It has allowed me to do more interesting things, maybe some more commercial as well. I don’t know, maybe not commercial — but at a composition, execution, and poetic level, it has. I feel like I’m in a much better place than I was 20 or 30 years ago.” In that sense, he’s clear about what he wouldn’t do for more recognition, understanding that success can also have an impact on his mental health and that traveling everywhere, without a single break between concerts and interviews, can make anybody lose touch with reality. “I think that pressure is very hard, and you eventually break,” he says.

Beyond his devotion to Metallica, or Ibero-American legends such as Miguel Bosé, he strives to stay up to date with what’s popular nowadays, following artists like Stromae and listening to headlining rock and metal bands of the 21st century, such as Ghost and Gojira. “When I listen to the new material by the Foo Fighters, I go, ‘Such cool songs! What a sound!’ That’s where I want to be, where I want to go,” he says. He also adores Juan Luis Guerra’s music, and in him, he sees the possibility of fluctuating between worlds.

He’s also always kept an eye on the music scene of his hometown and has put together a playlist called ‘Medellín’s new sound’ in which you can find artists like Feralucia, Pablo, Margarita Siempre Viva, Thomas Parr, Bella Álvarez, Providencia, Mabiland, and Crudo Means Raw.

It’s clear that Origen and Vida cotidiana are a trip down memory lane for Juanes. But what’s going to happen now, beyond shows and touring? What does he got planned? The answer is even more radical and interesting: “I dream about releasing an EP with at least six tracks of a heavier project I’m working on. I’m working on a more metal sound, because I like it very much.”

A few years ago, Andrés Cepeda said something similar to me. He wanted to make rock again and let’s not forget that Cepeda, Juanes, and Fonseca recently sang together at a show. That’s when Juanes hints at something big: “In fact, the three of us are getting into a project together because we lean into it, and it seems cool. It is something that can happen. But regarding my stuff, I have the metal project in mind, and yes, once again, less expectations!” he says with a laugh. It is something that he does solely and exclusively driven by an artistic interest, “thinking about the people who also enjoy it.”

After the innocence and passion of the beginning, the pendulum swung towards massive success and its pressures, only to return now to a place that closely resembles the starting point. People keep asking him why he doesn’t do something like “La Camisa Negra” again or why hasn’t he dedicated himself to pop-reggaeton, and his answer is very clear: “I’m not interested. My head’s not in it. I want to do what comes naturally, and if one day I can pull another ‘La Camisa Negra,’ good, but it’ll never be the same and probably be worse. That’s why I prefer to explore new places, you know what I mean?” For now, he’s continuing on, pursuing his own sounds.