Elvis Costello has shared “This Year’s Girl,” or as it’s known on the record, “La Chica De Hoy,” has been turned on its head by Chilean Latin pop star Cami who offers an exciting and unique Spanish language interpretation and modern female perspective of Costello’s classic song.
Written by Costello in 1978 about men’s lustful desires and society’s objectification of women, the song takes on a whole new meaning when sung from the point of view of a 23-year-old woman who is reclaiming the narrative.
“La Chica De Hoy” bows today accompanied by a powerful video, shot and directed by Carolina Rizzotto, that takes a page from Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” as Cami holds up and rips up signs featuring the translated lyrics. The song bows today accompanied by a powerful video, shot and directed by Carolina Rizzotto, that takes a page from Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” as Cami holds up and rips up signs featuring the translated lyrics. You can check it out below.
“It is an honor for me to be invited to perform the Spanish version of the classic “This Year’s Girl” by the maestro, Elvis Costello,” Cami said. “I consider myself part of a major change in the music industry regarding women and I feel like this song was very pioneering at the time, in the debate on gender equity. I am very thankful this type of song exists so we can engage in a dialogue and have a debate over subject matter that is still very relevant today. Women are grateful that lyrics like these exist for all of us.
“Elvis’s lyrics have meaning and they resonate and make you want to study the lyric to find out what he really meant to say in each phrase, that is beautiful. Elvis is an artist that I admire a lot. I grew up with his music and I even remember my dad singing to it during my childhood. However, the invitation to participate in this album was surprisingly good. I was in the studio recording my previous album and my producer Sebastian Krys invited me to participate. While recording the vocals, we tried not to change the lyrics from the original English version so much. As I expected, everything happened very naturally. There was something exceptional in our version that I’m so happy to share with you. I hope you enjoy it.”
Costello offers, “It’s so fantastic to have a singer like Cami singing “This Year’s Girl.” She’s got one of these voices where the microphone just loves her voice. It’s totally another story with a young woman singing it like this. Cami is telling her story, but she’s so cool. It’s such a hip way she’s singing it, and it’s a tremendous piece of work from Sebastian.”
In 2018, Elvis Costello had a dream where he heard his entire This Year’s Model album performed in Spanish. He reached out to frequent collaborator, Argentinian-born, Latin Grammy Producer of the Year, Sebastian Krys about the idea, and it wasn’t long before the two were recruiting some of the biggest Latin rock and pop artists from around the globe to interpret these songs in Spanish, backed by Costello and The Attractions’ original performances, for the daring, first of its kind record, Spanish Model, due September 10 via UMe.
As Costello and Krys began to think of artists that would be a good fit, they discovered that This Year’s Model was an important record to many artists in the pan-Latin world, but its true nature had never been fully appreciated because of the language barrier. They enlisted many Costello fans, a few who Krys and Costello felt would be a great fit for the songs and all of whom have stellar careers and were excited to participate and bring their own styles to the immediacy and poignancy of the original songs, helping to create an entirely new listening experience.
Spanish Model features such artists as: Cami, Draco Rosa, Fito Páez, Francisca Valenzuela & Luis Humberto Navejas (lead singer of Enjambre), Gian Marco & Nicole Zignago, Jesse & Joy, Jorge Drexler, Juanes, La Marisoul, Luis Fonsi, Morat, Nina Diaz, Pablo López, Raquel Sofía & Fuego, Sebastián Yatra, and Vega. They sing these timeless and universal songs, which have been expertly translated and adapted into Spanish to retain their meaning, energy, attitude, and wit.
The concept represents what may be a first: an artist replacing their vocals with newly recorded performances by other artists singing in another language, backed by the original music with 19 featured artists representing 10 countries and territories across the Spanish-speaking world including: Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, plus several from the United States.
The album includes 16 tracks drawing from the original U.S. version of This Year’s Model (“Pump It Up,” “Radio Radio,” “This Year’s Girl,” “The Beat”) plus several other songs from those sessions. The album will be available on CD, digitally and 180-gram vinyl.
This Year’s Model, which has been newly remastered, will also be released concurrently on CD and 180-gram black vinyl with the addition of “Big Tears” and “Radio Radio.” A limited edition version, that pairs both Spanish Model and the new pressing of This Year’s Model together as a 180-gram double LP, will be released exclusively via ElvisCostello.com, uDiscover and Sound Of Vinyl webstores.
Spanish Model was announced in July with the release of an exciting video from Colombian superstar Juanes, whose own recently released Origen album was also produced by Sebastian Krys and featured Pete Thomas on drums. His exhilarating performance of “Pump It Up,” (with its spitfire lyrics now in Spanish) manages to match the same intensity and feel as the original, while Costello’s original backing vocals provide the trademark chorus and an instant familiarity. The video plays on this by transforming Costello’s signature video by rotoscoping the original and inserting Juanes’ head in place of Costello’s to create a playfully updated version that’s a perfect blend of the old and new, that this daring album embodies. “’Pump It Up’ is such an iconic and signature song from Elvis’ amazing repertoire, that it was a real honor to have the chance to sing with the original 1978 recording and be a part of that propulsive energy,” Juanes said.