Chile is a country with a culture of electronic music that grows and solidifies day by day. Among the variety of export sounds that we find in this country in the south of the world, one of the names that has caught our attention the most in the last year is Hola Papá, a solo project by the composer, singer and experimenter Valentina Mardones (31) .
With composition and singing studies, in addition to an initial training always linked to music, Valentina Mardones began her career as part of experimental rock groups such as Zeptelar and MediaBanda, between 2012 and 2017. However, the following year he decided to venture into a solo project, from where he began to shed light on his creative freedom linked to vocal improvisation, and electronics with nuances ranging from experimental to pop.
This is how Hola Papá is born. A project that, although recently began to travel through the underworld of Santiago, has already managed to shake the scene with his debut EP “Hola Papá” (2019), a work that even earned him a Pulsar award in the Best Music Artist category Electronics.
Captivated by her atmospheres created based on the repetition of sounds, in addition to her improvised layers of synthesizers and percussions, we decided to go in search of Hola Papá aka Valentina Mardones to talk with her via e-mail. Here we share the result:
Valentina answers us from her room in Santiago, Chile. There, among his curiosities, he tells us that he has some fossils that he found during one of his trips to the Cajón del Maipo, an Andean area located near the Metropolitan Region.
-How have you lived these months of pandemic?
-At the beginning with several challenges and each one with its reason for being. I appreciate them, since finally they were necessary conflicts that were resolved to know and understand aspects about my loved ones and myself.
-This 2020 has raised new demands for artists and music workers around collaboration and coordination at a distance. What significant changes could you mention to us regarding your way of working?
-My way of making music hasn’t changed. But clearly the live performances have been through streaming platforms, and the adrenaline of playing in front of people physically present is unmatched.
-Do you feel there is more support among peers?
“Yeah.” I suppose that when we are going through complex challenges together, in some beings, empathy for the other person can grow.
-After traveling in the avant-garde rock and jazz circuit with bands like Zeptelar and Mediabanda, where you were able to show off your vocal skills and go on tour outside of Chile for the first time, what motivated you to start this solo adventure through experimental electronics ?
-I don’t know if I do “experimental electronics” the truth. My compositions are sometimes very different from each other. There are some very pop and others are more rare perhaps. At first it was not something that I thought alone, nor was it going to be something totally electronic. I had invited a bassist and a drummer, but then I realized that I could actually do it all alone with my machines. Also, something I learned in bands was that fewer people is always better.
-What differences do you notice between the environment of electronic music and the environment in which you developed in your beginnings?
-They are totally different environments. I can notice greater awareness of gender equality in the electronic environment.
-Would you like to continue trying different scenes or do you feel that you have already found an address?
-I have never felt within a single musical environment. Right now, I’m doing rap, doom metal and electronics at the same time. Maybe where it ends haha. I like many musical styles and I like to try them if I feel like it.
-The improvisation of experimental rhythms and melodies are a clear hallmark of your work, such as the recent “Too Far with my Crazy Loser Girl”, a five-track compendium where you can appreciate your creative freedom. What’s behind this disruptive aesthetic?
-Everything I compose is born from improvisation. That ep really is a set of improvisations. Only two of them are treated and compositionally arranged after being improvised. It was a very homemade ep. Almost pure direct sound from the mixer. Vomiting in the sense that I did not nod it at all, unlike the first one that is fully composed. I did not build any expectations, I just wanted to quickly vomit strong emotions that were out there and that’s it.
-The name of your solo project “Hola Papá” was the name of a band that you had during your adolescence, when you were a student. Why did you rescue him?
-It’s a random name that came from a list of possible names that we made with my friends for the band. I liked keeping it, since we never performed live with that band.
You studied in an experimental high school, did it have any importance in your artistic development?
-The education of that high school, at least when I was there, was no longer very alternative to the truth, therefore it had no relation to my artistic development. And before I was in a nun’s school, hahaha. It sounds boring, but it’s the truth. Zero contribution the school, it is the usurping entity of young souls in history.
-You grew up in an environment where music was central, and later on you studied singing and composition. You went from jazz and rock to electronics. And it seems that your trip still goes a long way. What projects are coming up now?
-A solo rap project I don’t want to reveal the name of yet. And another hardcore doom duo where I sing guttural and scream.
-Anyone from the South American electronic scene that inspires you or would you like to stand out?
-I would like to highlight the Colombian Filmmaker.
-At South Plug we quite like machines and we have noticed that you play with an analog / digital set. What machines do you have among your favorites? Why?
-I love them all, they are all favorites because they are infinite, like all instruments, including the voice as the most “divine” instrument due to the fact that it came with us at birth. You can give them infinite sound possibilities, or at least those they reach in a human life, be they digital, analog or flesh and blood.
-Finally, we would like to know your soundtrack from the last time. What songs have you been stuck with?
-Sorry to disappoint you. The truth has not been stuck with any song this last time. But what has been a discovery that amazed me and I hear frequently (I recommend them 100%) are the binaural sounds to activate the pineal gland. They really are exceptional for meditation or before bed. It is only that one that is worth gold, the others are a sham in my opinion, I do not think they are real binaurals.
