palabras BIANCA I LAUREANO

Some call her the female Carols Santana and the feminista in me cringes. Eljuri has her own identity and gives us songs some of the best male performers can only hope to share (without having their images challenged). I get the comparison; she’s fierce (and so is her hair). If I were to play along with the Santana comparison, I’d contextualize Eljuri’s sound to what he’s produced in the last 10 years: his compilations with other artists.

Eljuri has a range of genres on her latest album “En Paz,” proving her multiplicity as a musician and her ability to connect her Ecuadorian and NYC background. This album doesn’t just focus on her and her guitar, she can sing! It’s clear she wants a comprehensive sound with her inclusion of violins, drums, and brass; you can tell this is a complete work.

She begins by introduces us to her interpretation of dub and reggae in “El Aire” and satisfies our “Latin alternative” needs with “Sombra Negra.” She rocks out with “I Told You Before,” her only all-English track. She doesn’t stop there, her mastery of strings is demonstrated with ballads such as the title track “En Paz,” and she exposes us to her roots, literally and figuratively as her mom wrote the original lyrics of “Como En Su Sueño;” and the bonus track is the original song. Eljuri won’t let you forget her music isn’t just for your entertainment, but for sharing the history of struggle and search for paz. She’s not singing about heartbreak, lovers’ quarrels, and other staple songs Latina musicians are often expected to include on their albums. Instead, she gives us a more poetic and wholesome transmission of culture, not a small feat.

Rob Perez caught up with Eljuri for this Q&A Session

Cecillia Villar Eljuri is one of those artists you may wrongly assume takes herself as seriously as she does her music. Yes, her music is serious. Yes, she is a serious musician. But talking to her on the phone, she’s totally down-to-earth, giggling like a schoolgirl at times, and easy to talk to. In fact, we bonded over our Ecuadorian heritage, and New York roots. And her new album, En Paz, should definitely be on every Latino’s must listen to list, especially if you want to hear music that is honest, emotional, of the times, and will get you to “rise up” as Cecillia puts it.

A long time fixture in the downtown New York music scene, Eljuri has developed a stronger connection to her Latin roots in recent years. She’s Joan Jett, PJ Harvey, Julietta Venegas, Tori Amos, Andrea Echeverri all rolled into one, and a future member of that elite club.

Having found much of her inspiration for En Paz on her frequent visits to Latin America, especially her native Ecuador, Eljuri proclaims, “We’re lucky here. They’re lucky too. It’s a beautiful country. There’s just a lot of poverty. A lot of what I wrote on the record speaks to the spirit of the Ecuadorian people. We can be heard and it’s time to rise up kind of thing. I’m not saying I’m Bob Marley but it’s kind of got that spirit. Looking for peace, and that’s why the album is called, En Paz.”

The new album is En Paz. How would you describe the music on the album?
It does speak about social injustices but it’s not preachy, I hope. I don’t want to be preachy, I don’t mean to be. A song like “Tierras” is about fighting over borders and injustice. And fighting over differences rather than unifying ourselves over what we have in common. The Latino people, what we have in common is so powerful. The immigrant population in the US makes it seem like we are a threat of this society here. The threats of the society are all from everywhere. I grew up in the international melting pot of New York City, and I revel in what we have that’s different. And that’s what makes the US special. But I think people don’t have a clue about us, about the real Latino culture. But they’re learning. Our generation is changing that.

Is the music on En Paz different than anything you’ve recorded before?
I’ve always blended rock with Latin rhythms and other music. In that sense, I’ve done some of this before, but this is pushing the boundaries out farther than I’ve done in the past. In the past I’ve done more tropical rock. This is a blend of different rhythms but also, lyrically, a lot more intense. My last album I had one song called “Distant Thunder,” which was about war. Another song called “Caliente,” about being a Latina in the US. This one is all that. This new record.

You’ll definitely do a full-length English album again in the future?
It depends on where the songs lead me. I’m a songwriter first, so the songs kind of lead me. On this album I was traveling to Central and South America, back to my roots, and I was very drawn to my Latin culture. That’s why it came out more and more in Spanish. I did that one song in English because it just came out that way and I decided to put it on the record. But the theme of it all kind of made more sense in Spanish.

Did you purposely go to Central and South America, in particularly Ecuador to find inspiration for this album?
I can’t say I did it intentionally. It all kind of happened at the same time. I built my own home studio . . . I mean I recorded this in a lot of high-end studios. But as far as writing the songs, arranging the songs—because I play a lot of instruments—I built a studio. Then I went and traveled. I was in the middle of the whirlwind writing. And when you write, as a songwriter when I get into that head, it is good to travel. It just so happens I was down in Ecuador, Costa Rica and other places. It was just such a gratifying way to write. And New York, of course. The record was recorded in New York, Jamaica and LA, pretty much. We had such great guests that collaborated as well.

Guests such as Sly and Robbie . . .
They are really great!

Johnette Napolitano . . .
She’s from the band Concrete Blondes, and she was touring and doing her record. But then we collaborated on the song “Jaula.” I’m actually in the middle of doing a music video for that song. It was very cool to record with her because she’s traveled to South America on tour with Concrete Blonde, and she’s been to Mexico many, many times. She’s not Latina but there was real love for the blend of rock—because she’s such a rock maven—with the Latin pulse that’s in the song. “Jaula” really reflects that blend of her influence and mines. And she’s just got a really great voice. She’s amazing.

When you collaborated with fellow artists, what do you learn from them?
I learned how to take it out to another place that I wouldn’t think of. I’m comfortable with things I bring to the table. I was bringing a lot of the Latin and the rock elements. But then Paola Romano and Yossi Fine—those two produced the record—they were more into world beats, and Paola is very much into the rock thing too. Yossie is Jamaican/Israeli, so he was bringing a lot of the rhythm, a lot of the bass and drums, making it fit good. I was bringing more of the guitar solos, Latin. With all of that, it takes the song to a different place than you would by yourself. It takes risks. Sometimes I like it, sometimes I don’t because it’s unsafe, because it’s not familiar. But it’s also kind of thrilling because you don’t know where you’re going.

How did you hook up with Yossi Fine?
Through a really great friend of mine Fabian, and Paola. They said, “We know a great world beat producer, and you’re a great Latin songwriter.” I’m humbled but they were saying it. “If we put you guys together who knows where this will go.” That’s kind of the exploration that pushed . . . he’s a heavy-duty world beat guy. And he’s an amazing bass player who’s toured around the world with a lot of people. So we were trying to push it to the next level. I don’t want to do the same record I did last time.

Did you two click immediately?
Immediately. Paola, Yossi and I pretty much were the core around in which the record was built. The songs are the number one thing but once the songs were written and I brought the arrangements over, Paola, Yossi and I clicked really fast. We didn’t even speak half the time. We just communicated through vibe and energy, and listening. I would listen a lot because after spending so much time by yourself, writing the songs, harmonies and arrangements, you get caught up in your own world. It’s good to get that influence from people like Paola and Yossi. Take you out of yourself.

Where did you get inspirations for these songs and how long did it take to write these songs? Did it take months or years to write all these songs?
It took years because I was touring off the last record. At the end of that I started writing the songs. That was a couple of years ago. Some of it was 9/11, some of it is the war in Iraq, some of it is the immigration stuff going on. I don’t literally speak about immigration, but all the stuff that is going in the world—the fighting between the Israelis and Palestinians, and in South America there is always some turmoil—all that stuff was what had me going. It took me years. Then I said, “I’m not going to tour, I’m not going to play.” I played a little bit but I had decided that I was going to build my studio and write, write, write.

What do you feel you learned about yourself in traveling back and forth to Latin America over the past few years?
That’s a great question. I definitely learned that my Latin roots and my connection to Ecuador are a lot greater than I recognized growing up here because I was so assimilated here. I saw the Ecuadorian thing when I was home with my family, but when I was out with my friends and everything else, it was all American. American, American, American. I spoke English all the time, I was writing songs in English, I was playing English rock clubs. Then the more time I spent there, the more I realized that’s a big part of me. It is very much a big part of me. As well as some of the Lebanese and Spanish that I have. Like “Tierras” has a Lebanese/Middle Eastern flavor to it. There’s some flamenco on the record. Subtle flamenco rhythms from my Spanish influence. And you realize, it felt right and comfortable because it is a part of me that I didn’t recognize growing up, because I was too busy listening to Led Zeppelin, Bob Marley, Marvin Gaye, Missy Elliott, so many great people.

Would you say this is your most personal album to date?
No question. There’s no question. Because of all the things we’ve been talking about. You’re right on it. Lyrically, it’s pretty honest.