Paula Valls
  • country:Spain
  • region:Barcelona
  • style(s):Jazz, Indie
  • label:Satelite K
  • type:Band
  • gender:female
  • instrumentation:vocal, percussion, singer songwriter, guitar
  • artist posted by:Escenamusic

Line up

  • Daniel Ferrer (piano)
  • David Soler (guitar)
  • Miquel Sospedra (bass)
  • Oriol Roca (drums)
  • Paula Valls (voice)

Links

*** BOOKING WORLDWIDE ***

Paula Valls presents I AM (Satellite K, 2018), her first long-play, produced by David Soler. A more intimate and naked job where the silences also speak, displaying a different musical style from that of her impressive debut EP Black and White, (RGB Media, 2016). While Black and White was a first step towards professionalization, an experiment where she was telling other people’s stories, I AM, completely directed by herself, is a work where Paula Valls dares to talk about her own and recent experiences, about feeling lost and not finding herself, about difficult moments and changes, and about having to make important decisions - a reflection of her accelerated personal evolution, more often than not in a sad tone, full of farewells, but always with a hint of hope. This is her cover letter where she really shows herself. Songs such as “Monsters”, where she looks at the adult world from the point of view of a little boy who sees monsters, or “Days” (mention should be made of the collaboration with New Yorker Jonah Smith in a lovely duet) remind us – and herself – that life can’t always be easy. She also focuses outward in the critic “About Someone”, in which she reflects on the egocentrism of our present society, which must be denounced and changed. Two songs are included in Catalan: the first, “Cançó de bressol”, born after the death of her grandfather, was to be an untitled song and talks about loneliness and death, but with an enlightening message: we are not alone. The second, the bonus track of the album, “Que tinguem sort”, a duet with herself (aged 9 and 19) is a gift for all the people who have supported her from the beginning.
I AM could have arrived directly from the United States: the most American black music (soul, blues and jazz) and folk are intertwined with the key influence that the style of the producer Joe Henry has had in Paula from her very first age, in a recording made with a clear organic intention. Throughout the process, she has surrounded herself with a team that has escorted her while she was following her own path, and the result has been a lively album, all but square, that drinks from spontaneity and improvisation in
the studio, where songs have set the guidelines, where authenticity has been primed above perfection, as in a live concert. Paula Valls (voice, compositions) will be heading out on her I AM show tour, surrounded by David Soler (guitar and musical direction), Oriol Roca (drums), Miquel Sospedra (bass) and Daniel Ferrer (piano).