“Stop talking about politics and start singing.” Zahara (Jaén, 1983) couldn’t say how many times he had to hear the same thing. So many that that nonsense ended up being at the center of his artistic creation. An artist, but also a citizen, she treasures one of the most important songs of her life that was never published. It’s called This is not a political song, pure irony for those who tell her that she dedicates herself to singing and doesn’t get into puddles.
In a three-chapter “non-documentary” recently released on YouTube, Zahara tells her future self the story of that song that begins on August 11, 2021, when the singer became the most famous woman against her will. from the country.
His name made the news. In April he had released his latest album, Puta, and was preparing a summer tour, but several religious groups with Vox as their speaker managed to remove the poster from their concert at the Toledo ALive festival, the beginning of a censorious revival of the far-right party in several town halls. The censored poster showed the artist as the Virgin holding a doll, the baby Jesus, and with a light blue band with gold trim where the name of the album could be read.
Far-right groups interpreted it as an outrage. She remembers that she felt “groped, uncomfortable and manipulated.” She stopped watching Instagram and her cell phone. However, she had restraint and wisdom not to get into trouble. She only talked about a scenario to contextualize the censored image. It is only now that she dares to tell the intrastory of that controversy in three fascinating chapters of Guillermo Guerrero’s documentary.
At 12 years old they called her a whore at school. Do you think that by using that word for the first album, and then another, Reputa (2022), you have managed to redefine the term?
Whore is an insult that I have lived with since I was a teenager, and calling my albums that way is like standing in front of the grievance, and showing the discomfort with which I had to live. In a way it is an appropriation of the offense to make it lose its value, but it all depends on the context. If the word is accompanied by violence it still hurts. It is used very lightly, at least we have managed to put the word somewhere else, but I think there is not enough time to redefine it.
How do you write your songs?
I always look for balance. The lyrics and music are equally important. Puta’s lyrics are in the context of electronic music. I love songs because they seem to me to be a very complete artistic expression that in a few minutes captures a story, a complaint. I have managed to find a method that I repeat over and over again. I still think that the letters have to appear alone. First creativity, then discipline.
Were you surprised by the censorship or in some ways did you expect it?
Well, I was prepared for the song not to connect with many people, for it to be uncomfortable or seem very explicit or vulgar, but not for the album cover to be taken out of context, for there to be a direct attack on the artistic work, a attempted cancellation, and that everything became a global trending topic.
“Cool, but let’s not talk about that” is a phrase that those referred to, and even affected by some topics, say a lot to Zahara. What do you think is hidden behind it?
There are people who can’t deal with certain things or who simply resonate with something but have a hard time empathizing with victims, or recognizing themselves as victims, and they are more comfortable if I sing a ballad to them.
What do you expect from this new song?
I have made a necessary song, but it is long and complicated. I don’t expect much, I’ll settle for it reaching a small part of the audience. It’s all very difficult. There is too much everywhere. I think we are breaking the system and for the worse.
When will a
It’s not that there aren’t cases. There are, but there is a lot of shame, a lot of fear of the consequences, of the double punishment that the victim suffers when she tells it, of being told: now you tell it? When a woman speaks she is judged, she is held responsible. My proposal is that men start that
