“Right now, I happen to be in a contemplative mood—but I also experience moments of horror,” Luisa Almaguer tells Apple Music. “I feel horrified watching everything that’s going on in the world.” On Weyes, her extraordinary second album, the trans singer-songwriter from Mexico City unleashes a musical exorcism as powerful as it is unsettling. Her lyrics stare reality in the face, from pervasive homophobia to the loss of friends from prejudice and the systematic cruelty with which humanity degrades the animal kingdom. “So much of my life has been shaped by the lack of love, and the resulting angst definitely informs my songs,” she says. The most surprising facet of Weyes is the heart-wrenching tenderness that defines its tracks, from the languid orchestral beauty of “Wey” to the ethereal sophistication and psychedelic pop of the ambitious “Nube”. In Almaguer’s aesthetic universe, beauty remains untarnished by all the pain and discrimination. “I’m deeply moved whenever young trans people approach me in the street to tell me that my music brings them solace,” she says. “Standing by those who feel a bit forlorn—giving them some sort of refuge, or containment, is the greatest success that I could have ever imagined.” Here, Almaguer guides us through the album’s songs. “Un día nos vamos a morir” “It’s about unrequited love, the feeling that pervades my love life—that urgency, the desire to be cherished. This was the one track on the album that we finished really quickly. I already had the lyric, one day I came up with the melody, and I just had to record it. I enjoy the process of singing, and this track has a lot of drama in it. I wanted to create an explosive song, with huge tempo changes, and a return to the hushed mood of the intro. I just love to experiment.” “Wey” “This one’s directed to all the heterosexual men who love us—or claim they do. It’s based on a text message I sent to a guy, confronting him. It didn’t really matter if the words rhymed or not.” “Adiós a los amigos” “Written a long time ago, a good 10 years. I had a band called Lowboy, the band where I started my path in music. I was starting to transition, had some issues with the people who didn’t accept me, and that’s how I lost a bunch of friends. A friend of mine used to say this: ‘I should have loved you for your ephemeral qualities, but chose eternity instead.’ It’s important to know when to say goodbye. I wanted to reflect on that, especially following the pandemic, and with everything else going on in the world: wars, the climate crisis, all those things.” “Una Perra” “A more personal song about the state of the world—always tainted by discrimination. I’ve been vegan for the past eight years, and I decry the consumption of animals. Discrimination begins with them, thinking that you are superior to a chicken and assuming that you can eat it—how crazy is that? The illusion of privilege begins at dinner time. We go to the marches and demand female liberation, but consume pigs, milk from cows that are raped and their calves stolen from them—these creatures are 10 times more intelligent than dogs. There’s some serious cognitive dissonance at play. A bitch in the backyard, a pig in the slaughterhouse. Things couldn’t get worse.” “Weyes” “A short interlude, like a lover’s poetic complaint. ‘Love me with kindness, love me now, I’m running out of time.’ I keep repeating this to myself. It’s the thread line that runs through the entire album: demanding tenderness from men.” “Nube” “This track surprised me. It started as a simple love song but evolved into something different—more of an epic composition, with instruments and melodies all happening at the same time. It’s a bit like ‘Wey’; I feel those are the most fully realised in musical terms. Here we managed to evoke a feeling like reverie—unique and ethereal. It’s sad and dramatic, but also hopeful. It’s one of my proudest moments as a musician, and it all started because a dude broke my heart.” “Tío Hugo” “A gay boy dedicates a song to her favourite uncle. This song reminisces about my first reference points in terms of masculinity. My uncle Hugo was a sweet guy who often took us to school and was part of the little disasters in our everyday life. To me, he was incredibly cool compared to my dad, a cold and violent man. It was important to rescue that archetype, and I’m sure many of my dissident friends will identify. There’s always an uncle, a teacher, an ally during childhood who remains a reference of goodness for the rest of our lives.” “El más insoportable” “The ‘most unbearable dude’ is my boyfriend—my almost husband—Julián. My notion of love is something that can be difficult to bear, and that’s what Julián means to me: the one who is there, still there. It’s a love song, but it also addresses our non-monogamous agreement.” “María” “I wrote this one after my mother’s experience with cancer, in reference to the public hospitals in Mexico. We’re in the Tlalpan area, where the hospitals are prestigious, and yet the treatment of patients is unacceptable, especially to low-income people. I can’t quite process the fact that a policeman decides who can enter the hospital. It’s violence above everything else, and I will never be able to forget that. The message is harsh, but I made it as a happy song, so that it becomes more accessible. It’s the sole cumbia on the album, and it brings closure in a positive way, even though the subject matter is thorny. People from Latin America are well-versed in this: talking about issues that are dark, dense and profound. It’s our own way of dealing with tragedy.”