That of the vocalist Viki Lafuente has been another of the many projects that have been paralyzed by the pandemic, but that, even so, resisted giving everything for lost. “It has not been easy. A year without bowling, without concerts, without live music… ”, recalls the 40-year-old artist from Zaragoza.
After passing through La Voz, in 2019, a program in which the Aragonese singer captivated the audience and the jury in the blind audition with her voice, the artist took a turn in her life: music began to occupy practically everything. “It had always been there, right? I sing since I was a child as something natural, as something that comes from within me and that I need in my life. But going through this program gave me the visibility that perhaps I needed to jump into the pool “, admits.
That is why, once he left the contest, he set to work to direct his life towards what he truly loved: music. Before ‘Libre’, this first album, he enjoyed the success of his multidisciplinary show ‘Frida Kahlo, Viva la Vida’, which during the two occasions that he visited the Teatro de las Esquinas in Zaragoza hung the ‘no tickets’ sign.
‘Libre’ is made up of eight songs, some of them have always accompanied the artist while others are completely unpublished. “They are social issues that denounce violence and loneliness, that speak of human passions, but also of fun and the inner search for answers,” he says.
Something that defines her very well because long ago she decided to move with her partner to a town in the Pyrenees where they live with their two children. Together they run a mobile food business – a ‘cart’ – with which they worked during the season of festivals and fairs. “It was a way of being even more free, wasn’t it? Live without ties ”, he reflects.
For this reason, he assures that the name of the album is an allusion to his way of seeing the world and a vindication of those spaces in which we are still free. “We are free to walk, to feel, to create, to fight, to build, to cultivate, to express, to think, to dream,” he says.
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Something that, without a doubt, the pandemic has highlighted more than ever. “For me the pandemic has been like a smack that has forced me to stop in my tracks and to realize that everything was going too fast. Suddenly, everything that I had invested so much time in would vanish and I could do nothing but sit back and think that I had already done everything I could.“, recognize.
And it is that, in a moment and a society like the present ones, if there is something ephemeral it is the fame. “In part I feel that I have lost a very important year or so because our profession has a lot to do with the moment and all the pull that ‘La voz’ had given me is no longer there. The challenge has been to show myself that I could forge something solid and not fall into oblivion in spite of everything ”, she asserts.
As for his band, created in 2018, in his own words, that of ‘Viki and the wild’ is the project “that I have always been trying to forge”. A rock and soul band with grunge tendencies formed by Álex Comín (guitar), Humberto Ríos (keyboards), Jesús Martí, (bass), Gigi Cano (drums), Marta Heras and Sara Lapiedra (backing vocals).
A pandemic launch
Although the release of this LP has been 100% digital, the artist hopes to organize a presentation event in style very soon. “We have waited and worked so hard on this project… I wanted to present it in a big way, with people on their feet, dancing and sweating. That will have to wait for now, but it will come “, he claims.
In addition, the pandemic has also changed the way music is consumed and promoted. For this reason, the singer has made a great effort adapting to the audiovisual format, with the release of four video clips to date. The first was ‘Got to learn’, released a year ago on social networks, while the last was ‘The book’, directed by Víctor Izquierdo and starring the Aragonese actress Luisa Gavasa, winner of the Goya award in 2015.
“Life has stopped but music has not and it has been more important and necessary than ever. For me it is like the air that I breathe, it makes sense of everything I do. It’s what drives me, ”he says. He considers that music and art are also part of the self-care of any individual: “Listening to a song is taking time, stopping and smiling, feeling, being happy and nurturing the soul of beautiful things. A year and a half ago, going to a concert was something we took for granted that it would be there. Today, nothing is what it was ”.
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