In blush, Mexican artist Girl Ultra blends the bittersweet nostalgia of her emo roots with the modern electronic sounds of the club, crafting a sound that explores the complexities of womanhood. In her conversation with KALW, Mariana de Miguel delves into the creative process behind blush and shares her vision for what’s next.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
MARCUS: blush is a really awesome EP and there's a lot of different styles and genres and just flavors and vibes. What drew you to some of the genres? I know a lot of it's been explained as early 2000s. But I'm curious to know what drew you to them and how did you approach blending the different styles?
GIRL ULTRA: Yeah, because I feel “early 2000s” can be very vague. There was so much going on at that time but to me, especially in this album, I've always been a sucker for late ‘90s garage music merging into club music and all these textures. And then rock music comes in, some overdriven guitars with clean vocals, so I just took the task to experiment within that in this album.
MARCUS: The friends that you work with on this album. How was the process collaborating and how did each of them contribute to the final album?
GIRL ULTRA: For this album I wanted to experiment with a producer that really knew their club. And this friend called Sam Katz, he's from Denver actually, but he's been based in Mexico for a while for 10 years now, he did the last album from Cakes da Killa, and we just connected through another friend. And I don't know, we connected instantly and he's got a very clean and sleek approach to club. And I wanted to bring up a little garbage, a little grit to it. And I called Kiddziee, a producer from Monterrey [I worked with] on my past album before blush called El Sur. And basically we had a masterclass together of how we can tweak sounds and we can destroy sounds. And to me, that was like a perfect number in the studio, just three people making music, in Mexico City, in the studio that I'm always in. And I really enjoyed the result.
MARCUS: So I know the song “5to elemento” is a nod to the emo era. Can you talk about what that was like to revisit that and the inspiration behind that song?
GIRL ULTRA: Actually “5to elemento” was the first song that we did for the album. We started on the saddest side of things before hitting the club. And this song we sampled, we recorded some midwestern guitar, like very clean. And we decided to sample it and then add a very raw drum behind it. We just wanted to make an aggressive, sad song. And Sam [and I,] we were emo kids back in the day and it's great to revisit that from a different point of view. And then we sampled the same midwestern guitar on the second part of the song that is “bruce willisss” that connected to that. And we bring a new life to it.
MARCUS: And I'm curious too, because the song “bruce willisss”, it's obviously inspired by The Fifth Element, which is one of my favorite movies.
GIRL ULTRA: Likewise.
MARCUS: What elements of the film resonated with you?
GIRL ULTRA: To me, sometimes making songs can be a little cinematic. I just think about imagery a lot. What does this taste like? What does this look like? And I was thinking a lot about the whole concept of the film, just dualities and being in search of the fifth element. When we started doing the connection for “bruce willisss”, to me, it just felt like it was the runaway scene with Bruce Willis in the taxi and saving Leeloo, and to me that song was so beautiful. The speed was violent, it was just like running away from something. And yeah that's why I decided to make a full homage to that.
MARCUS: How did your own experiences shape the storytelling and emotional depth of blush?
GIRL ULTRA: Oh, in many ways. blush is a pretty personal album that I tried to make more general and reflective, especially for women in their late 20s, 30s. To me it's part of my relationship with beauty and how it's been shape shifting with the years in a superficial and in a very deep way. The whole theme of the makeup can bring so many meanings. Like it's not the same to apply mascara and just looking forward to going somewhere to see someone and the whole meaning changes when you cried and it's all over your face. So I just wanted to make that very physical.
MARCUS: That's really profound and it makes a lot of sense I think, especially how you perceive what it is that's there. You've been making a lot of music for a minute now, what are some of the most valuable lessons that have helped shape your sound along the way?
GIRL ULTRA: Oh, learning how to make mistakes and enjoying the mistakes. I think that's what brought me here right now. Just allowing myself to [explicative] things up and repeat and practice and not being afraid of rewriting, redoing, re-recording. To me that's the beauty of it all.
MARCUS: And I know that blush, it obviously marks a new chapter for you creatively. How do you see your sound evolving in the future? Are there any genres or themes you're willing to explore next?
GIRL ULTRA: A huge universe within club music, garage, drum and bass that I would love to explore. I would love to dive into trip hop. And yeah, I mean, wherever it takes me. I've been making a couple of very dark funk and disco that I never thought I would, but it's been fun. I feel like Girl Ultra is just the vessel for things.
MARCUS: Yeah, that sounds really cool. Dark funk. I haven't heard that before.
