NOSTALGIA

“Each song has a memory,” Pedro Tovar of Eslabon Armado tells Apple Music about the group’s new album. “It gives that nostalgic kind of vibe.” The tremendously popular música mexicana act has come a long way since their 2020 breakout Tu Veneno Mortal. Its celebrated follow-ups Corta Venas and Vibras de Noche that same year added more hits and fan favorites to their growing catalog. No small part of that success has come from Tovar previewing material on social media for his listeners, a process that helped inform the group’s latest album. A diverse mix of songs covering everything from heartbroken ballads to dramatic corridos, NOSTALGIA presents a clear view of the multitudes contained within Tovar’s creative world, one that continues to expand. Read on to learn more about each of these songs from the man himself.

“VETE A LA FREGADA”
“This one is a sad song that I wrote, in a style that we’ve had for Eslabon on others’ songs. It was for sure one of the late ones I wrote, like a couple of weeks before I jumped into the studio to record all the songs. The melody on the song is just so nice. I kinda got inspiration from the Mexican—I don't know what the genre’s called, but like Ed Maverick or Kevin Kaarl—that type of style.”

“DOS MORRITAS” (feat. Junior H)
“I was going to do a collab with someone else on this song. I was driving and I just put it on my truck and I was just singing it. People liked it, but people weren't expecting for it to be the artist that I wanted to be on it. They were telling me, 'Oh, it sounds like Junior H.' And I was like, well, I'm going to give what the fans want. I texted Junior H and I showed him the song. He liked it a lot, because he's a very corridos-type guy. People fuck with his corridos, so it gives it that style, that presence of Junior H. It sounds fucking badass.”

“MODO DEPRE :(”
“This song's probably one of my favorites, to be honest, with what it says in the lyrics. I think it's going to get people nostalgic, like they remember their ex when they hear it. It probably is one of my favorite lyrics I ever wrote, and I feel it's going to give people the memory of someone they really miss.”

“SI SUPIERAS” (feat. DannyLux)
“I met with Danny a couple weeks after we shot the video of ‘Jugaste y Sufrí.’ I met with him in his house and we were just trying to figure out if we could write another song. And then he had this little melody and I really liked it a lot. And he kept on singing and singing it, and I was like, ‘Why don't we do a collab with that one again?’ He was like, ‘Well, I'm fucking down.’ Then I started giving him ideas, he gave me ideas for the song, and we recorded it on his laptop in his room. We recorded it again in the studio and it sounds fucking amazing."

“LUCES ROJAS”
“This is a kind of like reggaetón. I like Bad Bunny a lot, so I wanted to give it that type of beat but with guitars. I did it previously on Tu Veneno Mortal Vol. 2; it’s called ‘Regresa Mami.’ And people really liked it. But it's a super intimate song with your loved one that you're just trying to hear in the car, or in the room by yourself. It gives you that vibe.”

“MENTE EN ALTO”
“This song's a banger. When I usually write songs, the easiest songs for me are the sad songs, then the happy songs, the romantic songs next, and then the corridos come last. The corrido is probably one of the hardest to write. I just can't come up with the lyrics that all my other friends like Junior H write. They're fucking raw. It's because they're from Mexico, and the slang from Mexico and the slang from if you're born here in the US, it's completely different. So I can't use it because I don't know any words from over there. So this song, it just came out of nowhere, to be honest.”

“LA PERRIÉ” (feat. Fuerza Regida)
“[Jesus Ortiz and I] have been talking for a long time. We've been planning to meet in person, because he's a funny-ass guy. He's hilarious, and he sees that I'm like that too. I do my funny YouTube videos here and there. I do my funny [Instagram] Lives. Then I had this song—it’s a corrido too. I showed it to him and he liked it a lot, but we were on and off about recording or not recording it because of labels. But in the end, we got to an agreement and he recorded it. His voice is just something else, dude. I'm going to hop on one of his songs in the future, too.”

“HASTA LA MUERTE” (feat. Ivan Cornejo)
“When I met Ivan, he was just playing guitar. He’d never sing. He was doing TikToks, just playing guitar, and I didn't think nothing of it. But then he just started singing out of nowhere. He posted a song of him singing and I was like, 'Dude, this kid's going to fucking blow up.' And then a month later, he releases this album, and 'Está Dañada' became one of the biggest hits. I showed him the song and he really fucked with this. It fit him so perfect with his voice.”

“LO QUE QUIERAS”
“‘LO QUE QUIERAS’ is a song that I wrote a long time ago. It gives me the vibes of my first album, like ‘Me Prendes,’ that type of style. Usually for an album I take two, three weeks to write the songs. But this one took me a long time because I wanted the lyrics to be perfect.”

“LAS HISTORIAS SE ACABAN” (feat. Sarah Silva)
“When I first wrote the song, I wanted to do it with a girl with a super soft voice. And I put it on my story like, ‘Who's a female that sings? Let me know because I want to put her on my album.’ And so a bunch of girls started sending me videos. I respect everyone's voice. But me, I was chasing towards that soft, super angelic voice. So then DannyLux sent me her Instagram and I DMed her. I sent her the song. I recorded it on my phone, and then I was like, 'Just sing on top of it.' I've never done that—a boy and a girl's voice together, singing together throughout the whole song. I never heard of that in regional Mexican. So we hopped in the studio, and she sings so fucking good. It's an actual duet.”

“MALDITO AMOR!”
“That's one of my favorite songs. It's one of the last songs that I wrote before finishing the album. This song is a really simple song and we were going to make it difficult, because I got a new member of the group. His name is Damon, and he took over my position of playing lead guitar. And he made the album sound completely different, and in a good way. People are not going to expect the sound of Eslabon going from super freaking normal to his sound going to an extreme. So for this song, he wasn't there to record it, so I had to record it. I play super simple, and we just recorded it like that. It's a heartbroken song.”

“SOLO” (feat. Erre)
“I was live on TikTok and I was just telling people, ‘Hey, send me songs so I could hear and react to them.’ And then someone told me about this kid: His name is Erre from Phoenix. I was listening to his music and I heard that specific song. I thought it would fit perfect in the album, because it's a sad song. I reached out to him and, well, we recorded this last week. His lyrics are so hard.”

“QUÉ DIABLOS HICE” (INTERLUDE)
“The last two songs, I wanted to make different. I really love R&B a lot and I really love indie. I was on tour, and out of nowhere, I just had the urge to buy a fucking ukulele. I don't know how to fucking play a ukulele, to be honest. But just with the chords—I know how to play guitar—it was pretty simple. I wanted to keep it short because I don't know if people are going to like it or not. I just wanted to experiment on it. But if it's short and people like it, they're going to want more.”

“SOLO PA’ DECIR”
“I wrote it exactly when I recorded the ukulele song. The next day I stayed to hear the mastering that they were doing to finish the whole album, and there was a grand piano right there. I've always wanted to know how to play piano. I know how to play some keys, but I don't know music theory. So I just started playing keys on the piano. I started freestyling in English and recording on my phone. After that, I put it into Spanish lyrics, and it's the same thing.”