Kali Uchis in Full Bloom - by Josh Hurst
There exists a false dichotomy between artists who push the envelope and artists who are torchbearers for tradition. On a crazy good new album called Orquídeas, Kali Uchis reminds us that the two things needn’t be mutually exclusive. She demonstrates casual mastery of contemporary trends in Latin music— the sonic, rhythmic, and attitudinal stances that have made stars like Bad Bunny some of the top draws of the streaming era— while also gesturing toward the kinds of folk idioms she might have inherited from her grandparents’ record collection.
This is hardly a new juxtaposition for Uchis, one of the most ambitious and uncompromising pop stars of her generation. Her debut album, 2018’s Isolation, was saturated in au corant hip-hop styles, along with upscale indie rock and state-of-the-art reggaeton. It also offered sturdy R&B throwbacks right out of the Daptones playbook— as if to remind us that she could have made a whole career following Adele’s trajectory, were she not for restless and forward-thinking.
Isolation is still one of the most colorful, creatively rich pop records in recent memory— but in retrospect, it almost feels like a prototype for Orquídeas. This is Uchis’ most seamless, most assured synthesis yet of the cutting edge and the sounds of the past, deftly splicing contemporary dance and R&B music with old-world boleros, cumbia, and merengue. It’s an album that’s steeped in history yet feels like it’s made of pure attitude, charisma, and kinetic energy.
About the album title: Orquídeas is named for the official flower of Colombia (for non-Spanish speakers like me, that would be the orchid). It’s unmistakably a gesture toward lineage and cultural legacy— a reminder that even the most en vogue sounds on the album were marinated in a particular diaspora. But there is also a suggestion of personal blossoming. Uchis somewhat famously followed Isolation with an entirely Spanish language album, generating public skepticism from her record label execs— and now here she is with another mostly-Spanish album that sounds triumphant, swaggering, inspired, and unapologetic.
To my ears, the album loosely unfolds like a three-act play. The first act dives headlong into cross-pollinated Latin, dance, and R&B, deploying one club-ready banger after another. These songs sound featherweight in the best way possible, graceful and unforced in their dancefloor-focused energy. In their elegance and soft-touch sensuality, they put me in the headspace of countless 90s and early-00s dance icons— Aaliyah, Kylie, Ray of Light-era Madonna.
On these songs and throughout the rest of the album, Uchis deploys her own richly expressive vocabulary of rolled r’s, playful coos, and deep-in-the-pocket singing. She rides shifting rhythms and changing tempos like they’re playground rides— and she’s not alone in doing so. Breakout Mexican singer Peso Pluma slides into “Igual Que Un Ángel,” an early album highlight, and mirrors Uchis’ easy charisma and no-sweat attitude.
Somewhere around “Diosa,” the album shifts into its second act, what Isabelia Herrera calls “sad-girl hour.” These songs trade in a kind of luxurious melancholy, sadness made to sound soothing and romantic. No wonder Herrera likens them to soaking in a clawfoot tub. Just when the album’s glistening club production style might dim, Uchis pivots to a resplendent bolero-style ballad called “Te Mata”— soaring vocal melodrama, a daytime soap opera slotted between Uchis’ disco fantasies.
The party resumes in the album’s final third, where every second feels optimized for maximum dopamine delivery. Here Uchis invites a troupe of Latin stars— El Alfa, Karol G, Rauw Alejandro— to share in the boisterous, shit-talking energy of American hip-hop. Best of all is “Muñekita,” a reggaeton rager that finds Uchis at the peak of her confidence, effortlessly purring and ad-libbing along with the yo-yoing tempo. A synthesizer mimics the plucked effect of stringed instruments, a striking signifier of Uchis’ past-and-future mashup.
I mentioned the word fantasies, and that seems like the best way to characterize Uchis’ lyrical concerns. The songs detail scenarios of badass women who accept love only on their own terms— and who have no time to suffer fools. Uchis flips between Spanish and English frequently, often within the span of a single sentence— another forceful show of her borderlessness. For non-Spanish speakers, she leaves plenty of English breadcrumbs to convey the spirit of her songs: “I don’t do frenemies”; “Those who don’t adore me, bore me”; “Watch out, she’ll walk you like a dog— woof woof!”
Attitudinally, the songwriting feels contemporary, which is what makes the throwback songs feel so resonant. I’m not just talking about the old-world romance of “Te Mata.” There’s also the opulent, string-drenched soul ballad “Heladito,” which could have been included in Isolation (and would have been the album highlight). Closer “Dame Beso // Muévete” brings in boozy horns for a funky blast of salsa.
You can hear these songs as acts of reclamation— opportunities to revisit familiar forms, and to sing about the kinds of subject matter Uchis’ grandmothers couldn’t have gotten away with. But maybe it’s better to think of the album as a continuum— a way of recognizing that the dream of self-possession is exactly what connects Uchis to the women who came before her.
My rating: 8.5 out of 10
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