FEATURE:
Revisiting...
Camila Cabello - Romance
__________
AS her excellent…
PHOTO CREDIT: Christine Hahn
new album, Familia, is out and has won lots of acclaim, I wanted to revisit her previous studio album, Romance. Released on 6th December, 2019, it is a terrific album that I don’t think got as much praise as it should have. Though many critics did provide it a positive review, there were others who were less excited and positive. In any case, it is an album that we need to hear more from. Reaching number three in the U.S. and boasting seven excellent singles, a lot of the album was inspired by her relationship with Shawn Mendes. It is a wonderful album that I would recommend everyone checks out. Not purely Pop, there is Rock, R&B and Latin vibes running throughout. Although there are quite a lot of producers and writers credited, it is a case of the artist themselves being the dominant force. Camila Cabello has such presence and gravitas that she makes every song her own. Familia is much more about family rather than Mendes. I think the two have parted ways, so one can understand why her third album takes on a different lyrical direction. In any case, Romance is engrossing and satisfying listen. As Forbes wrote in 2020, Cabello discussed themes and influences on Romance as a part of her whirlwind promotional duties:
“1- Her relationship with Shawn Mendes inspired much of the album
While Cabello never called him out by name or outrightly talked about her real-life romance with fellow pop royalty Shawn Mendes, she alluded to being in love throughout the evening – and especially how it helped her songwriting.
“Now I just have pages and pages of notes in my phone about details of what I’m experiencing, which is so much easier to write about because it’s an almost endless well,” she said. “When you don’t have a person to write about that you’re not experience fully, it’s all in your imagination or you’re writing about a feeling as opposed to the calluses on your fingers.”
2- Her sophomore album is more genuine
After releasing three studio albums from 2015 to 2017 as part of Fifth Harmony, Cabello made her solo album debut (titled Camila) on January 12, 2018, with this second Romance one being released December 6, 2019 — and even she can feel the difference in the song-making process.
“On the first album, I just really wanted to impress the people I was collaborating with,” she admitted. “I feel like this time around, I really got to bond with the people that I was collaborating with because I wasn’t trying to impress anyone anymore.”
Also, many of the songs are now rooted in what she’s experienced the since that last album. “You can’t make that stuff up, you have to live it. That just came from real experience,” she said of the emotions of the album. “I think that’s what I enjoy the most.”
3- Emotions drive her best songs
While some have hypothesized that “First Man” may be about Mendes, during this session, she said it stemmed from her relationship with her father, Alejandro Cabello.
“I’m realizing as I get older just how many things in life are paradoxical,” the Cuban-born singer started off. “If I sat down to write down a song with the intension of touching dads and daughters’ hearts, it would never happen. My best songs have just come out when the memory itself I’m talking about is more important than the act of writing the song. And for me, I was just thinking about my dad — that’s the strongest emotion, love for my family.
That ended up being the first song she wrote from the album, as she headed in with one goal: “My intension going into the studio is always: How can I be the most authentic version of myself? How can I be the most true to what I’m experiencing right now?”
Unfortunately, the song was leaked and she didn’t get to reveal the song to her father herself, but says his reaction was just as powerful: “I never saw my dad cry before.”
4- She still aspires to be “Shameless”
Despite being a picture of confidence and assuredness on stage, Cabello says she started the album off with “Shameless” since it’s a vibe she’s still trying to achieve.
“I want to be the embodiment of the song,” she said. “That song is like, I don’t give a f*ck. It’s just so fearless. I’m putting myself on the line. I want to be like that song. I want to be that song. I’m still ‘Dream of You’ Pisces energy though. I’m still used to this frickin’ Pisces sensitive energy.”
5- Some of the tracks have been years in the making
The jealousy of an ex moving on faster comes to life in “Cry For You” — but she clarifies that experience from a time in the past.
“I love being petty on this song. That was actually from an idea I had when I was way younger,” Cabello said. “That’s not something really something that happened in my life this time around.”
When she was 16, she did write a song with the same mentality — which she sang a few lines of to the audience with the lyrics: “I’m pissed off, you’re happy.”
“It was so stupid,” she said. “’Cry For Me’ is way older, petty big sister.”
6- She wants people to fall in love
She also mused throughout the evening about what makes relationships so special.
“I honestly just think that those quirks and those details about people are what makes you fall in love with them,” the singer said. “Those things that are imperfect, really specific details of a person, especially the imperfections are what makes you fall for them.”
And she hopes to spread that feeling to those listening to her songs. “I get excited from tweets of people who are like, this album makes me want to fall in love,” Cabello said. “I just wanted to inspire people to dare to feel something and dare to put yourself out there fully and love boldly”.
I am going to end with a couple of reviews for the brilliant Romance. This is what AllMusic wrote in their review. This is an album that is not only for fans of Camila Cabello:
“Is there a name for the opposite of a break-up album? Because that's what Camila Cabello's sophomore effort Romance feels like: a record as bursting with ecstatic emotion and erotic desire as the exuberant delirium of having just fallen in love. It's a palpable vibe she put on display during her blush-inducing performance of the single "Señorita" with her duet partner (and boyfriend at the time) Shawn Mendes at the 2019 American Music Awards. The performance ended with Cabello and Mendes teasing a kiss, a bold move that left the audience excited for what the rest of Romance would hold. What Cabello does reveal on Romance is an artist continuing to refine her distinctive pop persona as she happens to be deep in the sway of love. Working with a respectable cadre of songwriters and producers including Andrew Watt, Finneas O'Connell, Justin Tranter, and others, Cabello digs deeper into her Cuban heritage with songs like the aforementioned "Señorita," the horn-accented "Liar," and the yearning "Used to This," that display her growing sense of maturity, balancing pop, reggae, and R&B flourishes with even more Latin embellishments.
If 2018's Camila was about striking out on her own after leaving her former group Fifth Harmony, then Romance is about Cabello defining herself in the pop landscape and setting herself apart from contemporaries like Ariana Grande, Dua Lipa, and Taylor Swift. Consequently, the album feels bigger in scope with a slicker pop production aesthetic than her charmingly pared down debut. There is one break-up song on the album in "Should've Said It," a defiantly steamy anthem in which Cabello reclaims her independence from a former flame against the backdrop of a Santana-esque guitar hook. She strikes an equally swaggering, rock-inflected stance elsewhere, leaning into her throaty, scritch-scratch vocals on "Shameless" and showcasing her knack for soaring falsetto balladry on "Living Proof." Along with catchy hooks, what makes Romance particularly compelling is Cabello's candor and willingness to share her experiences and emotions in striking detail. On "Easy" she sings, "I never like my crooked teeth/You tell me they're your favorite thing/Anything else?/The stretch marks all around my thighs/Kiss 'em 'till I change my mind about everything else." If Romance is an album about Cabello feeling loved and seen by someone else, it's just as much about her seeing and understanding herself as an artist”.
The last thing I want to source is the review from Rolling Stone. A more confident and rounded album than her debut, Camila (2018), Romance won a lot of love. This is what Rolling Stone had to offer:
“On her 2018 self-titled debut, Camila Cabello was a sultry pop singer who didn’t mind looking inward in her music, exploring an emo intimacy with a classic-feeling soulfulness. On Romance, she’s just as much of an open book. This past year the singer ended one relationship and then found herself in a new one — coupled up with Canadian crooner Shawn Mendes — and she uses that narrative as a backdrop to sharpen her writing and deepen her sound.
Cabello explores romance in all its forms: love, lust, and, in her most adventurous moments, the toxicity that can come from it all. She pushes her voice to new places on the opening track, “Shameless,” an explosive pop-rock standout where she piercingly sings about submitting to a consuming obsession: “My emotions are naked, they’re taking me out of my mind.” On the vengeful “Cry For Me,” she snaps and wishes an ex all the worst over Eighties-huge guitar shredding. “Why won’t you cry?” Cabello wails in desperation.
Like her friend Taylor Swift, Cabello has mastered the art of playing fleeting relationship moments for maximum dramatic impact. She finds vulnerability in her pen game on the doo-wop ballad “This Love,” hitting her stride while trying to free herself from an “It’s Complicated” affair. “You know how to fuck me up, then make it okay,” she belts, then adds, “Get out of my veins,” a line that brings to mind the way she likened a crush to shooting heroin on her hit, “Never Be the Same.” Billie Eilish’s brother Finneas drops in to produce and co-write “Used to This,” a hot and haunting ode to her latest relationship. Camilla’s writing is confessional and rich as she breathily sings, “The calluses on your fingers I admire them from a distance/Now they’re on my cheek.”
With “Havana” hit-maker Frank Dukes back onboard, Cabello continues to explore Latin-influenced sounds that reflect her Cuban-Mexican roots. Curiously, “My Oh My” is a digital-only track — maybe it wasn’t completed in time for the hard copy? But it’s the juiciest moment here — a “Havana” sequel where Cabello indulges in an epic, after-hours fling. “He’s only here for one thing, but so am I” she slyly admits. DaBaby’s fresh feature makes it a certified banger. Latina Camila also thrives on the brassy and sassy “Liar.”
Romance includes her smash Mendes collaboration “Señorita,” which fetishizes her own Latinidad as the two sing about a night of ooh la la‘s and dancing amid a “tequila sunrise.” It may be their biggest hit to date, but that cliched lovers’ story feels out of place within an otherwise revelatory album, where she discovers new ways to give her artistry a new edge”.
I shall end up there, only to say that people should check out and spend time with one of the best albums of 2019. Familia is an even stronger album; signs that Cabello is growing all of the time as an artist. Romance did get a few mixed reviews, and I don’t think its tracks are played as much now as they should be. One listen of Romance is enough to make you…
FALL for it hard.