Hey Nomad Kitties,
This is the story behind our newest single “SLEEPLESS”, dedicated to hard working mothers and caretakers. It’s the lead single from our new album Papaya recorded in Mexico.
One cloudy sunny afternoon, Sonia Erika sat in El Tres Da Nova’s new apartment. They smelled a pineapple, smoked some weed, drank some tap water, and had a psychedelic conversation about “Sleepless”.
There is an audio version of this:sit back and listen while you enjoy a spliff. Otherwise, enjoy a summary of this lovely conversation, which was originally and fully posted on our Patreon a week before the release! Join us and get full access to the behind the scenes <3
Thank you #NOMADKITTIES for making this possible, much love.
Sonia: Hello, everybody. I’m here with the one and only El Tres Da Nova, a.k.a Alexander Lekhtman. I am Sonia Erika. We are part of Death Is A Business. And I really wanted to make sure that we had this session because last episode when we were with Coach Steph Z, she was asking me a lot of questions about “Sleepless,” the first single coming out of the album.
I did not feel like I could answer those questions by myself because you are the original creator and author of this song.
And so I wanted to gather us here today with a little bit of ganja as usual, and talk about “Sleepless”.
Wow. So let’s spark up this joint. This is actually from a brand called Dog Walkers. And they give you mini pre rolls. I’ll show you guys. And it’s very cute. The bud tender said it was very psychedelic.
El Tres Da Nova
I should open my windows. Oh, you know what, I need to add an ashtray to my new apartment wish list. I’m going to do that.
Sonia
Share your list with me. All right, so, Alex, “Sleepless” how did this song become a reality?
When did you compose this musical idea? What parts of it did you compose?
El Tres Da Nova
My fingers are definitely all over the arrangement. I wrote this song before our nomadic journey to Mexico. I started by composing the song on guitar. Then I wrote the lyrics and the vocal melodies. After that, I started working on basic parts for the drums, bass, and keys.
Obviously, we worked with the musicians in Mexico, I didn’t write all the parts. I just gave them some direction. They really pulled through and brought it to life. When we were in the studio, there were ideas that were thrown about.
Our bassist Ulysses had some ideas for the horn players. Beto on sax and other Beto on trumpet killed their parts, so did Eduardo on the drums and Tona killed on the piano.
Sonia
It’s pretty awesome that this song originally started with you and then ended up becoming a collaborative piece with multiple musicians in Mexico. This is why this song is actually on the Mexico album, even though you wrote the song before the journey and the music video was filmed almost 2 years later in Brazil and Wisconsin.
What artists inspired Sleepless?
El Tres Da Nova
Musically, there were several main sources of inspiration I can think of. I’ll just say that Stevie Wonder, Kendrick Lamar and Anderson Paak each inspired the music. The other individual that inspired the musical vibe of the song was actually Chocolate Brown, who’s an artist that we’ve worked with in New York.
I really wanted to create a funky, soulful kind of tune. And I had this combination of inspiration from those different sources.
Sonia
But what is this song about? For people that are waiting to see this music video.
El Tres Da Nova
Well, the lyrical message of the song is inspired by my mom and her experience as a mother.
This track, “Solange”, is dedicated to one immigrant, a mother and a wife, who is as faithful to the American dream as to the Bible she keeps by her bedside. The same woman who ardently supported Donald Trump started looking at her white co-workers and neighbors differently after seeing George Floyd murdered on TV. The woman who tells her children they’ll never know what it’s like to cry from being hungry, and gets angry when she thinks they take her sacrifices for granted.
Sonia, what inspires how you made the music video and sang the song?
Because you also added a vocal and some lyrics to it?
Sonia
Yes, I did, my rap.
When I heard the song, I just connected that rap to it, and it was something that I had I had been carrying with me for a while, but I hadn’t put it in any song. I chose this song because it has such a strong female presence with your mom.
But actually it was super interesting because the music video ended up being completely different from what I initially imagined: I thought it was going to be a music video with the main protagonist being your mother, but actually the main protagonist in the music video ends up being your grandma: Iracema Da Silva.
Your grandmother is the main character of this music video. And that is what inspires me a lot from this whole piece. Now that we’ve gone from the beginning to the end.
El Tres Da Nova
I can’t believe we visited my grandma in Brazil while we were processing the release of this song.
Sonia
What was that experience like for you?
El Tres Da Nova
You and I visited Brazil December 2021—my first time visiting without my mother. We went to her hometown of Ipu, a small but growing town in the countryside of Ceara in the northeast.
Sonia
And what was it like seeing your grandmother this time around? I know that this time around her body was not as physically mobile as it once was because after the pandemic and getting COVID-19, she is basically a new and different person.
El Tres Da Nova
Yeah. Grandma was somewhat incapacitated, she can no longer walk or talk. Thankfully, she’s being well taken care care of by her daughter, Luciana.
Sonia
Yeah. That was something really beautiful and powerful that I am so happy I experienced. Your aunt Luciana, who happens to be the youngest of the daughters, is so committed to her mother. And I really appreciate that, because I feel like now, as we are in the year 2022 we really neglect our elders.
It’s really beautiful to see your aunt prioritizing and taking care of your grandma, even though it might be super tough because I don’t want to sugarcoat it either. I think it’s definitely a heavy task and being there helped me realize that it takes a community effort to take care of our elders.
El Tres Da Nova
Yes, Luciana has made a lot of sacrifices for her mother.
Sonia
That’s why in the music video, Luciana is the second protagonist outside of your grandma.
I really resonate with the song because it’s about the stories of families and immigrant women and wanting to leave home for a better life and then kind of forgetting what we truly, really loved and cared about and trying to remember that.
When I hear the name “Sleepless”, I’m reminded of your mother and how she’s constantly working hard to achieve her dreams here in America. She works two jobs.
And then at the same time, now that we are here in the U.S.: How do we give time to our families that we’ve left? For you it is Brazil, for me, it’s Mexico.
How do we stay connected and continue giving love to our family, our elders, and even to our parents when that happens? Because I’ve told you about how my parents didn’t get to see their parents before they died because they, unfortunately, did not have papers to be able to go back. And so they missed the death and the funeral of their parents.
I think it’s an intricate balance trying to go back and be present, but also trying to move forward.
El Tres Da Nova
It’s definitely a challenge and I think a lot of that is definitely reflected in the song. The musicians did a really great job.
Sonia
They did an amazing job. Can you share a little bit more about that experience because that was just super crazy. We were in Mexico, and I don’t remember why we decided to start recording music. How did we have that plan?
El Tres Da Nova
I remember originally we were just going to record “Mother Earth”, and that was because you felt that the time was right for the world to hear a song with apocalyptic undertones. And so I think, if I remember correctly, that was the original plan: go in and record “Mother Earth”.
But, of course, that was in the middle of lockdown, which was global at that point. Same as in Mexico, as in the US. And it took us a couple of months to really put the pieces in place to be able to record. Also traveling a lot with your parents delayed the planning. Basically when you and I got to our second visit to Oaxaca City, May 2020, we really started to get serious about the recording project.
At that point we decided that we were going to record eight songs, including several of our own, which we had already been working on even before the pandemic. Back in New York, we had already been workshopping and practicing a lot of this material.
So we were already prepared in a way.
Sonia
Yeah, that was super crazy. Well, we were prepared, but eight songs was definitely a lot.
El Tres Da Nova
I remember in New York in early 2020, you were already pressuring me for us to go in and record new music because we had just started singing together, me and you, seriously. And at that point I was teaching you some of my older songs and you were very ready and eager to record and make music videos.
So this was already something that we had been talking about months prior and then when we got to Mexico it seemed like the time to put that plan into action.
Sonia
So how many of those eight songs that we recorded with musicians in Mexico are on this PAPAYA album?
El Tres Da Nova
We have five and then we have a few additional tracks that were just put together outside of those recording sessions, the interludes.
Sonia
Do you want to talk a little bit about the interludes?
I think they are what actually makes an album. You and I have had this conversation or argument in the past: I’m all about singles and you’re actually the first person that made me consciously think about albums and how I really feel about them.
Initially I said: “Albums suck! There’s only one or two good songs on the album that’s it. That’s all I want to listen to.” But you said, no. Albums tell a story.
El Tres Da Nova
Yeah, it’s really funny actually, because I’ve been trying to do some more research about this. There are many listeners like you so the Recording Industry Association of America recently revised the rules for determining how to count album sales. Listeners like you aren’t really purchasing albums or even purchasing digital downloads of them. And so the industry created this new concept called “album equivalent units”.
It’s not based on actual sales of the album. If just one track on the album is streamed X amount of times that’ll count as one album sale.
So for example, the new Kendrick Lamar album had about 250,000 album equivalent units sold in its first week. But that doesn’t mean that it literally sold that many albums. It just means that X amount of people streamed it X amount of times, and now that’s how they’re counting it.
Someone researched the Drake album and they found that 60% of the streams on the Drake album came from just two of the tracks on the album. This means that basically the industry is rewarding artists for putting out high performing music. But not for how much fans in the audience are engaging with the whole piece of music.
Sonia
That’s really crazy. So then why make an album if people aren’t really listening to the full album? I guess those are two different things.
El Tres Da Nova
Well I think both can be true: It is possible to create a larger piece of work that can be enjoyed as a whole experience. But I also think that the individual songs on that album can work really well on their own.
Sonia
Well, tell us about the interludes. And what the fuck is an interlude?
El Tres Da Nova
Well, the interludes are interesting, they are definitely something that I’ve gotten a lot more interested in doing in more recent years.
You find interludes and skits in hip hop albums. It’s a way of telling a story through dialog, through sounds.
Sonia
What are some of your favorite examples of interludes?
El Tres Da Nova
I don’t know if I would call this my favorite example, but I just think it helps illustrate the point of having an album:
In Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid Maad City, there are all these interludes throughout the album which are recordings of his mom or his dad calling him on the phone and basically they are asking him when he’s going to come home.
It’s kind of funny, humorous, but it also helps advance the story because the whole album is a story about him as a young person going out in his city and getting involved in all these crazy situations.
Sonia
And how did you choose the interludes that make up our album PAPAYA? What is the first interlude people will hear? How many interludes will people hear?
El Tres Da Nova
There are three interludes on the album.
The first interlude that people are going to hear is from an interview that I did many years ago with a guy named Timothy Tyler.
Timothy Tyler is what we might call a political prisoner, a political target of the war on drugs. And he basically went to prison for 26 years for federal charges related to LSD. And then he was pardoned and able to be released from prison and he shared with me his whole experience of what that meant to him to be behind bars and how he had to survive in prison and adapt to the crazy situations that were around him.
Sonia
He was actually set free?
El Tres Da Nova
Yes, so the interlude is our conversation after he’d already been out of prison.
Sonia
Why did you choose that interlude “Timothy”?
El Tres Da Nova
Because the next song that comes after it on the record is a song called “Drive”.
Sonia
Wow. I didn’t know that. Because for me, “Drive” sounds like it’s a song about struggle and wanting to chase your real dreams instead of doing something for security, which I appreciate. I really appreciate that song. That song is on the album, too.
And then after that, what is the next interlude?
El Tres Da Nova
The next interlude is the “Solange” interlude, Solange Da Nova.
Sonia
Your mother.
El Tres Da Nova
Yes, she doesn’t know she’s on the album.
Sonia
Why did you choose to have her?
El Tres Da Nova
Because the next song that comes after that is “Sleepless.”
Sonia
I’m starting to see the theme here. Do you want to describe that interlude at all or do you want to move on to the third one? What is the third and last interlude?
El Tres Da Nova
The third and last interlude is with Sonia Erika’s mother, Rocío Peñaloza. You know what? I bet when your mom hears it, she will say, “Oh, Sonia, you shouldn’t have used that one. You should have used that other recording that I told you about. Why don’t you ask me?”
Sonia
My mom is very detail oriented. Which is something that I love and struggle with.
But it was really beautiful for me to record that interlude because we went to the forest with our pup Nilo. We were just walking and I knew I had the intention of recording her singing a song that my grandmother used to sing. So when you guys hear that album, you’ll hear my mom and I singing a song that my grandma used to sing. Do you want me to sing it right now?
“ Estaba la pájara pinta sentada en un verde limón
Con el pico meneaba la rama
Y con la cola meneaba la flor
Ay si ay no
¿Cuándo vendrá mi amor?
Ay si ay no
¿Cuándo vendrá mi amor?”
And that’s all I’ll sing for now. I just loved it because going back to the themes on the album, I definitely think that’s a big theme on the album: Mothers, Grandmothers, Freedom. And I wanted to honor my grandmother because I didn’t really get to know her, and I feel like I kind of took her for granted while she was alive.
And you did edits for that.
El Tres Da Nova
A little bit. But that and “Solange” are John Tournas contributions.
Sonia
Oh, yeah. John made it sound super trippy.
El Tres Da Nova
On that same interlude, we hear the sound of a mariachi band welcoming your parents coming back to Mexico for the first time after 21 years.
Sonia
That’s what it is? I forgot that’s what it was. I thought you guys sampled that from somebody on the Internet selling mariachi sounds! Beat websites, eBay. Oh, wow. So you guys sampled that from when my parents met their siblings for the first time after 21 years!
El Tres Da Nova
Yes, that is why I put it there. I wanted it to lead into the last song, “Make Love.”
Sonia
That’s beautiful. Wow. I really appreciate this album because it was definitely my homecoming story.
I think the last song “Make Love” was the reason why I wanted to really record in Mexico. When I got there, my family was meeting me for the first time, and they heard my music, they heard our music, and they said,
“It’s great, but I don’t know what you’re saying.”
I was so embarrassed. “Oh, my God, they’re so right. What are we doing? We don’t have any songs in Spanish? I am Mexican.”
So that song was written on that trip. It is the only song that we made from scratch on that trip and wrote with the other musicians. I think it’s one of my favorite songs that we’ve ever made together.
And it was inspired by a nude beach in Mexico, that’s why we called it “Make Love.”
El Tres Da Nova
That’s inappropriate. But yes, it is a very cool place.
Sonia
It’s an amazing place. And it’s very political. And I think that’s what makes it a great last song because it really embodies the whole album. So I appreciate you. Thank you for helping create this.
Okay, that is the end of this episode. We really, really hope you’ve enjoyed it. And big, BIG shout out to our Patrons, #NOMADKITTIES thank you all so much for your support.
Thank you for helping us get artists paid a living wage for their art.
El Tres Da Nova
Yes, thank you to our patrons. And if you’re not our Patron yet, what are you waiting for? You’re going to love it!
El TRES DA NOVA RECORDING SLEEPLESS
SONIA ERIKA RECORDING SLEEPLESS
ULISES TELLO RECORDING BASS SLEEPLESS
TONA RECORDING PIANO FOR SLEEPLESS
BETO DELGADO PLAYED SAX FOR SLEEPLESS
BETO OBREGON PLAYED BRASS FOR SLEEPLESS
EDUARDO VAZQUEZ PLAYING DRUMS FOR SLEEPLESS
DEATH IS A BUSINESS RECORDING THE ALBUM IN MEXICO