Interview Xenia Rubinos: “No one comes out of the womb feeling like an outcast”

I think it’s a combination of both, because I had definitely wanted to challenge myself to focus on my lyric writing a little bit. I felt like that was maybe not a weak point, but a point that I wanted to evolve. I wanted to challenge myself to be a little more specific just in my writing. On a personal level, a lot of things were kind of coming to a head, including the gun violence that continues, the Black Lives Matter movement and the death of my father while I was making this album. A lot of things took shape around me as I was in that process. The things that I touch on in the album are observations.

I’d just say that those things were occurring while I was writing this album and it was on my mind, things that were on my daily feeds. It was kind of inescapable on the summer that I was writing the album. The Mike Brown case was happening, and it was just unavoidable. In general, in my writing I tend to reflect whatever I’m going through personally. For me, it’s usually directly related to whatever I happen to be living at the time.

I see myself first and foremost as a singer and second as a composer. So I don’t see myself as an activist intentionally going out of my way to make social commentary. I wouldn’t call it coincidence, but it is just pulling everything from around me to write in the moment.

I’ve actually been listening to her quite a bit over the last two or three years. I toured a lot with my first record and on some of the last ours I did, national tours in the US, I was supporting Man Man. I ended up being the only woman on tour for six or seven months. I’m used to working with men and being surrounded by them, and I never realised how much I missed a female presence until that tour! I was so cranky, I didn’t understand what was going on! At the end of shows people would ask me for autographs and I’d start drawing vaginas on their records! I was like “man, I think I miss a female presence in my life.” So I started listening to Erykah and she became my friend on that tour. I delved more into ‘Worldwide Underground,’ which was a record I hadn’t really given the time of day to before. There’s a great track on there called ‘Back in the Day.’ She was my companion. I feel like she’s so good at talking about the quotidian and just being so relatable with this sonic space you can luxuriate in.

I was delving into hip hop, and I was delving into Sly and the Family Stone, Rufus, Chaka Khan. ‘Tell Me Something Good’ was a big inspiration; Chaka’s vocal performance on that track was really inspirational for ‘Lonely Lover’ and ‘Mexican Chef.’ So there was a mix of things, and I think that’s reflected in the sound of the album.

I’m just trying to build my own signature sound. I’m really proud of this album because I was able to further develop my sound, search through music that interested me and put my own spin on it. I’m less interested in being part of a genre and more interested in developing my own style.

It’s a challenging aspect of writing and putting yourself out there, because people need to categorise you in order to understand you better. I think a lot of times folks have called my music “Latin music” because I myself am Hispanic, I’m Afro-Latino. So I think the way that I look and the way my name looks just means people have sometimes not taken a listen and just slapped on whatever they thought by looking at me. That can be frustrating and complicated. A lot of time I feel like people writing about music actually describe everything else but the music. I mean, I don’t envy that job! It must be a difficult thing to do. But in terms of categorising my music as “Latin,” I think it’s incorrect. Mis-categorisation can be annoying; it just makes it harder for people who might like your music to actually find you.

I was just trying to delve into my own identity more on this record. Others do the other-ing, you know? No one comes out of the womb feeling like an outcast or a weirdo, we all do that to each other. For me, I’m definitely not coming at you like “I’m so misunderstood.” All these conversations always come from the perspectives of others and not me personally.

I’m not sure, but I’m excited about playing and being able to perform it live for people. It’ll be good to see how folks connect with it and how they react. I love going to new places and just getting to experience different cultures by playing. It’s a real experience because I’m going there to work, but you’re thrown into this new situation where you get to learn a lot about the people of that place.

Photos: Camilo Fuentealba, courtesy of Xenia Rubinos.

Xenia Rubinos’ ‘Black Terry Cat’ album is out now via Anti- Records. She plays London Birthdays on 24th October.

Tags: Xenia Rubinos, Features