Series
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Getting to Know Ruben, Not Alejo

August 21, 2024
Puerto Rican singer Alejo shares his biggest reggaeton inspirations, how his collabs with Yandel and Karol G came about, his favorite thing about LA, and the surprising way his cat Cosmo inspired his album “En Esta Nos Fuimos Lejos.”
Show transcript
00:00
What is up y'all?
00:00
We're here with Alejo.
00:06
Are they nice to meet you?
00:07
Yeah. Yeah, I'm the intruder,
00:09
the intruder here to take the freaking mic and like,
00:12
hey, I'm gonna do the show,
00:14
man. Well, thank you for coming out,
00:15
dude. Thank you for having me here.
00:16
Honestly. Yeah, for sure.
00:18
I live in L A doing a couple of things I
00:20
can't say right now,
00:21
but I'm excited to,
00:23
to do them and for people to see them.
00:25
So. All right.
00:26
Well, I mean,
00:26
something you can't talk about,
00:27
you just got back from tour.
00:29
Where were you? I was in Spain in Spain specifically.
00:32
It was crazy, man.
00:33
Like, what's the craziest thing?
00:35
Like I feel like the culture is like,
00:36
I'm sure different. Like it was the most like my opening
00:39
thing going to Spain is always super cool because it's a totally
00:42
different culture. Even though they speak Spanish,
00:46
I guess it's totally different things and like the food,
00:49
like everything like the streets,
00:50
the people. It's just amazing and honestly like the fans there
00:54
hardcore. I love it.
00:55
I love it. I love it.
00:58
And you've always left your mark.
00:59
On the reggaeton world.
01:00
But like which reggaeton inspired you growing up?
01:03
I mean, I've always said that *** yam,
01:05
I feel like I can listen to like all *** yum songs
01:08
and it still sounds fresh.
01:09
I love *** yam.
01:10
And also those are my favorites.
01:13
I love them. I heard the mainstream stuff going up.
01:15
I'm Mexican, right?
01:16
So we grew up with Lup Rivera and then even I'm not
01:19
going to lie radio Disney,
01:20
bro. I was a little kid.
01:22
And so my mom's music,
01:24
she liked menudo and stuff like that.
01:25
Manuel is I in Puerto Rico.
01:27
Like my mom used to listen to Manuel a lot.
01:29
So yeah, I think it was,
01:30
that's like a Latino culture thing.
01:31
OK? So I got a little bit of mix but like
01:33
theon stuff, I kind of just got the mainstream.
01:35
So I wanted to see if you had any,
01:36
you know, deep cuts.
01:37
I feel like reggaeton like became like worldwide probably like 10 years
01:42
ago or less. So like,
01:44
I like I get it.
01:45
Puerto Rico was a very local thing,
01:47
like maybe Colombia was a winner but it was like pretty
01:50
local. Then Balvin came up and then a lot of
01:54
recon and he spoke about Balvin,
01:56
we actually spoke to him recently and like,
01:58
he's always chill dude.
01:59
Like, you know,
02:00
but I want to talk to you about your collapse because you've
02:01
done like with Caro G you collab with fade.
02:04
Like what's like the craziest collapse story that you have?
02:07
Like, so I was doing premise un too was doing
02:11
like, I think it was the first time doing their
02:13
their, their awards in Puerto Rico.
02:15
So they did like UMA Manoe,
02:18
two legends Dono Man Dan do Aleon with a Y and guess
02:24
which artist they picked me to do with Yandel.
02:27
So I had to sing Sexy E Mio Rata.
02:29
But my version and Janel was there and after the la the
02:34
premis ava I posted a story like me performing that and John
02:39
there was her dancing the song to me singing to it.
02:42
So I tagged him and he was like,
02:45
bro, I love,
02:46
I love what you did.
02:47
Let's do something. I was like,
02:49
no way, bro.
02:49
I was like, yeah,
02:50
yeah, send me something.
02:51
I was like, OK,
02:52
so I went to the studio and like there are like six
02:54
songs sent it to him and he was like,
02:56
bro, come, come out to Miami,
02:58
let's do the video and everything.
02:59
So I mean that was crazy when I think about it.
03:02
I was like, bro,
03:03
let's take a straight out of a movie.
03:05
Like let me see what happen and you talking about IG and
03:08
then all my collaboration,
03:09
my big collaborations were crazy story like fade was my preview
03:14
went viral on tiktok Le Panico and he was like,
03:17
he reacted to it and I hit him up on Instagram
03:21
He responded, bro,
03:22
like we did a song in like two weeks and the song
03:25
was the number one in the world when it released.
03:26
It was crazy. And KD the same thing like f called
03:29
me like, bro,
03:30
you send me on,
03:31
it's like someone legendary is gonna be on the song.
03:33
I was like, OK,
03:34
and the next day he calls me,
03:36
he's like the, the song's done,
03:37
It's Caro to Colombia.
03:39
We're gonna do the video,
03:40
bro. Crazy. And the power of social media.
03:42
I feel like people are ah social media is all like shitty
03:44
and negative. I'm like,
03:45
it, it can work in your benefit.
03:48
That's Yeah, I mean that,
03:51
that easy ad me next day you like on the plane that
03:56
I keep hearing the,
03:57
the ring hit the table like what's up with the,
03:58
with the jewelry, bro?
03:59
Like I like, I like it.
04:01
So this Shane, the people that don't know.
04:04
I did an original album called Fele.
04:07
I had a cat called Cosmo.
04:09
This is the cat called Cosmo.
04:11
He died but he died like a year prior to the release
04:14
of the album. And every time I do an album,
04:16
I try to do like a,
04:18
like an object that identifies the album and I was like,
04:21
it has to be Cosmo and I haven't like,
04:23
I'm not an artist that I used to like open up to
04:27
personal stuff. So when I did this album,
04:30
I had the, the intro super personal and I called it
04:34
Cosmo and I was like,
04:35
I have to do the shame.
04:36
Yeah. And the,
04:37
and the idea of the Shane too was because of this album
04:40
I had a lot,
04:41
a lot of info of like,
04:42
og reggaeton artists, a Father Can De Laredo.
04:47
And they, they all have this big,
04:48
big change. So I was like,
04:50
if I'm gonna do that,
04:51
I have to go like,
04:52
with that flow and more on the album,
04:53
I wanna like, you know,
04:54
put people on Alejo,
04:55
like what song from this album or in general from your whole
04:58
like library are like,
04:59
listen to this and you know who I am.
05:01
So from this album maybe if you wanna get to
05:05
know me and know what I've been through Cosmo,
05:09
definitely, that's the intro of the album.
05:11
That's why I wanted to start the album with,
05:13
if you wanna know what type of music like I feel like
05:16
represents Alejo from this album.
05:19
Definitely Rodon, Casa del Rao,
05:22
la Roche wiki wiki with Joel,
05:24
if you know, I don,
05:25
you know Joel and Iran.
05:27
So I love that song.
05:28
And I mean, I asked you earlier what you're doing in
05:30
L A but like,
05:30
what do you think of L A so far?
05:31
Like, have you had a lot of spots or like,
05:33
I have a couple of days here?
05:34
So it's been cool.
05:35
I love it. Very,
05:36
very cool. It's not compared to New York.
05:38
Maybe it's all like the same vibe per mundo gorio mundo like
05:42
you know, like high speed but here's like you get
05:45
to choose. Yeah,
05:46
you get to choose what you wanna do here.
05:48
So I love it.
05:49
Well, you're welcome back here.
05:50
Any time specific to the studio.
05:51
Thank you for your time.
05:52
Thank you. And what happened in my English here?
05:57
No, man, you're good.
05:58
I mean, I,
05:58
I went to Spanish but like no English is fine,
06:00
like perfect. And where can people find you on social
06:03
media? Alejo Viz,
06:05
Instagram, Tiktok, Twitter and la di da Alejo Ale
06:10
and Alejo signing off.