Spanish Singer Travis Birds on Her New Album ‘Perro Deseo,’ Taking Inspiration From Quentin Tarantino

Bernardo Cecioni
·6 min read
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Singer Travis Birds is one of the most recognizable and promising voices on the Spanish music scene. Self-taught, Birds began playing and composing at the age 19 when she was struck by a deep existential crisis, what she now calls “my tunnel without light.”

Her first album came about through a combination of crowdfunding, word-of-mouth buzz and a series of happy, chance encounters, laying the groundwork for her breakthrough international success with her second album Coyotes, whose title song was picked for the soundtrack of hit Spanish series El embarcadero (The Red Pier) from Money Heist creator Alex Pina.

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Her single 19 dias y 500 noches [19 days and 500 nights] a cover of the famous ballad by legendary 20th-century Spanish singer-songwriter Joaquim Sabina, part of an album of Sabina covers, topped the Spanish charts, exceeding Birds’ wildest expectations.

Her stage name, Travis, is a tip of the hat to Robert De Niro’s character, Travis Bickle in Matin Scorcese’s Taxi Driver. She picked the surname Birds, she says, because as a child she was always told she had “birds in her head.”

Birds’ new album, Perro Deseo, dropped on Oct. 6. She spoke to THR Roma as she was preparing for her upcoming tour to promote it, discussing her inspirations, collaborations and why her new album contains 11 songs.

Travis, let’s start by talking about the album. When did you realize what direction you would take with Perro Deseo?

It was during the Mosquito Coast tour for my previous record that I realized I wanted to explore something different. We started brainstorming by considering different genres of music: Bob Marley, Amy Winehouse, and Nancy Sinatra; but also movies and books that were a big influence for me. As for texts, we chose Federico Garcia Lorca and other older-generation poets. Central and South American literature from the Siglo del Oro, magic realism. When we focused on what we wanted to do, I started writing lyrics and bass music, and from there we moved on to harmonies and vocals. This process starts from scratch, all of us can contribute to the song until it is finished.

You said we, all of us. There is a sense of community in this album. People like Diego Herrera collaborated, even on the videos. You can feel that there is a group, ideas flow from one mind to another. When you work with Tato Latorre and Paco Salazar in music productions, what is your method?

Well, I always try to develop the idea with everyone, I never want my idea to be just that. I really appreciate the value and wisdom of the people I work with. Tato Latorre and Paco Salazar are part of my little family. The chemistry between us is very natural and that is what makes our productions so special. They are brilliant when it comes to finding the right sounds and musical textures that complement my lyrics. They are always willing to experiment and bring new ideas to the table. Their attention to detail really elevates our songs. We work as a team. We discuss ideas and sometimes even challenge our creative limits to come up with something new and exciting.

This happened, for example, with “Peligro,” a song with a very Italian look and sound and very connected to Italian-American cinema, like the soundtracks of Quentin Tarantino’s films, which had already inspired the video clip of my song “Coyotes” in the past. Danger was important in setting the pace for this album, because it’s very different, you know? It was a collaborative process where we relied a lot on our individual skills and the magic that happens when all the creative minds come together. I’m grateful to have had the opportunity to collaborate with them.

Your artistic evolution from 10 years ago is evident in the music videos. The clip for “Cada Minuto” is the only one of those you made for this album that says in the description, “Original idea by Travis Birds.” How did the idea come about?

The truth is that with “Cada Minuto” the first thing I thought of was this “film” inspired a little bit by [Call Me By Your Name director Luca] Guadagnino and other movies, let’s say, and then writing the music with this story in mind. Although obviously then the video is not able to represent what was imagined because the imagination can contain anything. [Director] Joaquín Luna did a spectacular job and we were able to tell the story of this relationship that starts with her hitchhiking and very soon becomes an obsession.
Obsession was crucial to convey because each song on the album has a main emotion fueled by desire: Fame = “A Veces Sueño”; Possession = “Cada Minuto”; Freedom = “Mis Aires”; Ecstasy = “Peligro”; Inspiration = “Perro Deseo”; Lust = “Cuando Satán vino a verme”; Magic = “Grillos”; Action = “Una romántica”; Love = “Urgente”; Loneliness = “Oruga”; and Beauty = “Canción del Valle.”

Why 11 songs?

I know I’m going to sound crazy or something, but since you’re the first person to ask, I’ll tell you that the number 11 has haunted me all my life. This album was supposed to be 10 songs because I think all albums should have at least 10 songs. But when we saw that [Spanish singer-songwriter] Leiva was going to collaborate on “Grillos,” which was a very short song and I didn’t know whether to put it on the album or not, we decided it would have 11, we added “Grillos.” Reinforcing the fact that the number 11 haunts me.

You have done a lot of collaborations in your career, especially in albums by various artists, such as the tribute to Joaquín Sabina. On “Mosquito Coast,” there was a vocal collaboration and an instrumental one. In this album, there are two singers (Depedro and Leiva). How did the collaborations with these two important musical figures come about?

I always wanted to work with Depedro and as soon as we wrote “Urgente,” the collaboration developed naturally, it was very easy for us to connect musically and I think you can see in the song itself that we were able to communicate our ideas by putting the song first. With Leiva, we didn’t know if it would happen because there were logistical problems and also Grillos is a very different song from the ones he does on his own.

His songs are very broad and “Grillos” was initially just a guitar track. But when I recorded with him he asked me if I wanted to leave it like that and that touched my soul, it showed me that more than anything else he understood the song and would defend it. Asking him to sing on this song was a question that cost me some time, I think I even asked him 24 hours before I recorded it, and when he said yes it was incredible. The song is also one of my favorites because it does not follow the formula of most of the others, it simply describes a magical moment.

Check out the video for Travis Birds’ “A veces sueño” from Perro Deseo below.

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