Balthazar Aguirre

Listen

Playlist

Transcript

Ryan: My guest on today’s show is Balthazar Aguirre from the psychedelic funk trio BALTHVS, based out of Bogotá, Colombia. If you’re a fan of bands like Altın Gün and Khruangbin, BALTHVS is very likely your kind of jam. On today’s episode we talk about a song that reminds Balthazar of home, as well as pivotal life moments that changed his musical trajectory, the music scene in Colombia, the band’s approach to releasing music, and much more.

BALTHVS is currently on tour in the United States and will embark on a European tour shortly following, so be sure to visit balthvs.com to check and see if they’re coming to a city near you. Stay tuned to the end in order to hear a song from BALTHVS. But first, let’s get to the damn thing. Let’s make a mixtape.

[Intro Music composed by Scotty Sandwich]

Ryan: Thank you, Balthazar, for joining me on this episode of Let’s Make a Mixtape. Uh, we are of course, yeah, we are of course talking about homesick songs that remind us of home and you picked Spellbinder by Gábor Szabó, the Hungarian guitarist from decades past.

Why did you pick this track and why does it remind you of home?

Balthazar: I guess it reminds me of that moment when I was 20 and I was just leaving my parents’ house. It was just like the last three months before I left for good. We’re talking about like 12 years ago and I was getting really serious on guitar, getting very confused because, university, all that stuff.

And I was already, I was in law school, actually. And I was very confused, cause I was really liking this. It was like, wow, do I really want to be a lawyer or what do I want to do with my life? You know, that kind of thought. And I really felt in a very safe zone when I came home from classes and my little part time job I had.

And I just went back home and I remember smoking some weed and grabbing my guitar and playing the Spellbinder album as a whole. And I came from a more of like a psychedelic rock, kinda guy. And then because of Santana, I got to Gábor and I just started being mesmerized, spellbinded by his guitar playing because he had ideas that I would have never thought of.

And just that feeling of being at home after no responsibilities anymore, or I did have them, but I didn’t care. I was just in my safe zone, playing guitar, looking out the window to the park and just playing guitar and listening to Gábor and trying to learn Spellbinder note by note. And I guess that’s a sensation of home and that one, when you asked me what song feels like home, I clearly got reminded of that moment in my life that felt like a safe space, that’s when I really felt I wasn’t alone. For me, I really felt music had my back and it always has.

And, and that’s, I guess that’s why I picked that.

Ryan: So, so home to you is this very personal feeling and connection that you have with music, then? It’s not a place. It’s a feeling and a connection with sound and that mood.

Balthazar: Yes. When I look at the very low moments of my life where my psyche has been very vulnerable. And low, low vibration in general. It’s never been people that have taken me out of that. Obviously, people have always- you know, friends and family. But, you know, it’s very varied. People always have- they have their own lives going on and stuff.

And, I don’t know. It’s not in my personality or my upbringing just to share my feelings with other people. So the one thing that did feel like a true emotional support and somebody having my back out there was music. At first listening to music and then playing music, which it was completely other level, enjoying music was.

Playing it was orgasmic almost, but I don’t want to call it lust. It’s no, wasn’t lustful at all. It was very spiritual. It was more like a mother rather than a lover. It can also be a lover, I guess it’s confusing, but in that moment, it was more like a caressing mother that was like, “everything is going to be all right.”

I guess that’s why I do this because that’s my safe space and I keep doing it and you cannot see it from my cam right now, but I’m just surrounded by guitars.

Ryan: My bass, I have two of ’em right next to me. So I know that feeling.

Balthazar: I’ll just show you my- I got it right here.

I always have an instrument at my arms reach because I’m still at home. But that’s where it really started that, in that room in my parents’ place. Listening to Gábor. That’s when I said, “Oh yes, I want to build this space forever in my life.”

Ryan: I identify with that. As a kid, I was very introverted and I would find myself just going to- using music almost as a form of not necessarily escapism, but I mean, I get that, that, that sense of that comfort, that like being present with the music and just feeling, feeling full on that. Yeah, that’s beautiful. It really is.

Balthazar: It’s medicine, man. I’m not preaching out there. It’s just, just a personal thing.

Ryan: I’ll preach it with you, man.

[Transition music]

Ryan: The initial description you gave sounds very, very personal, intimate for yourself, but when you’re playing music do you feel like you’re sharing that feeling of home with other people? Do you feel like they are part of your home when you’re performing? Or, I guess, what is that relationship like when other people are involved with the music that you’re making?

Balthazar: Oh, it’s great because I stopped feeling so selfish about it because I really feel like- it’s only like about myself, but music has this thing that you’re playing and everybody’s connecting to that at that moment, whether they want to or not, some people is going to like it. Some people might not like it, but people are going to be affected by it regardless. And I just try to do my best to come up with a middle ground that I’m serving myself and I have to like it as a first condition. And then I really hope- and I’m really making an effort to relax people because that’s what I use it for, especially for that.

It’s not for getting sexy time necessarily, dancing necessarily. Sometimes these feelings happen, but mostly what I really strive for is just relaxing people because that’s what I use it for.

Ryan: Interesting. I feel like that comes through in the music that you’re making. It’s very chill. It’s very – I hate to use the word – vibey. But it’s very vibey. I think you pull it off nicely.

Balthazar: I hope that comes across because I’m always trying to tell myself, “chill the fuck up, man.”

Yeah, you got to chill out, you got to relax, cause like I’m a very uptight controlling person. Everything has to be very organized and stuff. And music just like, “Oh, chill out.”

Ryan: How do you take that approach with music? Do you do a lot of improvisation counter to that?

Or do you stay away from the improvisation and focus on an organized template when performing.

Balthazar: I’m a song-crafter. I really focus on songs. However, the reason I’m a professional musician, that music became a career for me, was pretty much watching either Santana or, especially, Jerry Garcia.

And obviously, if anybody knows anything about the Grateful Dead is the improvisational aspect to it. So we’re not trying to be a jam band or anything by a long shot, but we do incorporate a lot of improvisation within our very extremely well-rehearsed tunes. So there’s many areas where with this section, it’s open.

Like we know the key and we know like where we can head. And when we know where we’re going to go back to, or we’re going to land the plane after the exploration, but it’s very controlled and I like it that way. Controlled chaos.

Ryan: I love it. Or controlled chill out. Yeah. Chilled chaos, chaos on ice. There you go.

I had only really heard Of Gabor’s music recently. And that was the first time I heard of it referenced was the band Causa Sui from Denmark put out a record. It was a Szabodelico, which, have you heard that?

Balthazar: Yeah. What’s the name of their label?

Ryan: El Paraiso.

Balthazar: I love their sleeve designs. They’re really inspiration for me when I’m designing my own sleeve designs. So I love El Paraiso and the roster. Causa Sui was a big thing for me in high school when I was more into post rock and instrumentals, psych rock and things like that.

Ryan: Yeah. You can look at an El Paraiso release, look at the album art, and just have an idea of how it’s going to sound without hearing a beat, which I love. And so you say you do all the design for your releases?

Balthazar: Yeah, we do. We don’t outsource anything. Like we’re BALTHVS and you hear a BALTHVS record or you buy a BALTHVS vinyl. I did the design and we did the music together and I mixed it and I mastered it and everything. The vinyl master as well. So we take care of that because it’s the only way to make a living. To be a full time musician, not outsource anything.

If you start paying other people for that, it’s going to be very expensive. And at least I cannot do that. I’m trying to make a living here because that’s what I enjoy the most to be doing this full time. Not having a job.

Ryan: You said you were initially in law school.

How’d you make that switch? Was there something that clicked that was just like, “I can’t do law full time. I’ve got to do music full time.”

Balthazar: I had a rock climbing accident in 2014 and I almost died. And when I was in the clinic, I was like “if I had died today, I would have been extremely unfulfilled.”

I was pursuing law school in a mediocre fashion and pursuing guitar in a mediocre fashion and pursuing rock climbing and mountaineering in a mediocre fashion. I was tired of being a jack of all trades, in that way, I felt very incomplete. So I said, “I’m just going to do one thing and I’m going to try and do it right.” I went for music.

Ryan: How did the band come about?

Balthazar: That was way before because BALTHVS is a 2020 band and that was in 2014. So I had no idea about how to do anything music related other than just play guitar, kind of trying to play guitar.

And I started a band called Aguirre Cosmico and it was a psychedelic rock band. I was just trying to have a Colombian version of the Grateful Dead and Santana pretty much. And that was my music university, you know, just five years doing shitty gigs and learning and making a million mistakes.

And that’s how I learned. And then by 2019, I was fed up with that. It’s like, okay, I learned enough. I’m done with this. And then with all this knowledge that I accumulated with Santiago, because Santiago was the drummer for the band as well, I decided to pull up this new project, started recording music on my own.

Then I told Santiago, “Hey, you want to be on this?” And he was on that. And by that time we already met with Joanna and we clicked and that was like a clear thing I learned from Aguirre Cosmico that I wanted to balance the masculine with the feminine. I didn’t want to have a little testosterone overload that I had on my previous band, which was all guys.

We were all very athletic about it. Very aggressive, long extended jams, but you know. Very masculine, I suppose. So yeah, Joanna really helped in shaping the sound.

Ryan: I mean, I’m a little bit biased cause I’m a bass player myself, nowhere to the caliber of Joanna. Her bass lines are just tasty. They groove hard.

Balthazar: She’s a little monster, you know. I think it’s so unfair people focus so much on her beauty, where she’s doing so much. She’s singing and dancing and playing. And I’m telling you, I know a lot of pro guys better than her as a bass player, but they cannot do the three things at the same time, you know, like dancing on heels and moving and dancing while you’re playing, you know, that takes takes a lot. So I always give credit to her.

We always try to do as much as we can. As a three piece, that’s the greatest challenge just to fill up the space. And it requires a very high level for the three musicians, because any little mistake, you’re going to notice. It’s very different when it’s a bigger band. So much is going on, you can not do something. So maybe make a little tiny thing and it’s not gonna be that noticeable. Whereas on a three piece, everything’s on the line. All the time.

Ryan: You can’t hide anywhere. That’s impressive.

Also speaking of impressive, I was looking at some of the Spotify Wrapped numbers that you played. I think the most recent one, it showed that you were listened to in 178 countries, which I think is 91 percent or something of all countries. So you have a massive global following. How did- I mean, you said 2020 band, it’s 2024 now spring when we’re recording this and you’ve spread about the world.

How did that, how did that happen?

Balthazar: Oh, the internet, baby. I love that stuff. I love it. I’m a child of the internet. I’m a secluded, introverted guy that loves the computer and loves all things technology. And when I was a teenager, as a shy introvert, I was quite the gamer. And I was very attuned with knowing everything and trying to be very knowledgeable about the internet.

So for us, that’s the magic that we can be chilling here in Bogotá, Colombia and, without leaving our homes, we can contact people from all over the world. And we’re influenced by the world because we’re so privileged. Like some people say, “Oh man, I wish I was born in the seventies.”

Hell no, I don’t want to be born in that time. I sure as hell don’t because today I can listen to every single piece of recorded music that’s been recorded by humanity for free in my phone, in a computer within a two minute access. I just gotta take my phone right here and we can look for Vietnamese music from 1985 and we’ll find it, or we can go Colombia 1962, or we can go-

I don’t know, UK, grime from the UK from 1992. So you got like the Library of Alexandria of music and our music is very influenced by that because I’ve never limited myself to whatever’s listed out here in Colombia. I couldn’t care less to be honest.

Santiago and Joanna are far more Colombian than I am, I’ve always kind of rebelled against it. Especially because I’m really aggressive when I listen to some music that makes me uncomfortable, I get really like very uncomfortable.

So it was my mission to create my own music bubble because I couldn’t complain about it. I was like, “the only thing I can do is just offer something different to the world, if I don’t like this certain type of music.” And I started getting a lot into Turkish music, specifically.

I could read it. It felt like if that was my music kind of thing, I started playing that music as well. And I noticed how it really flows with me to play that music. I guess that’s why we have an audience in Turkey, for example, which is, we have more, more listeners in Turkey than in Colombia.

Ryan: I can definitely feel that seventies, sixties Turkish disco kinda leaking into there.

Balthazar: If you try “Famagusta Port”, that’s just a tribute to a Turkish folk, Famagusta Port.” “Colombian Girl” is a hundred percent the Turkish. And “Turkish Coffee.” That one is self evident.

Ryan: It seems like that genre is getting a lot of recognition. A lot more people digging up some of those older artists and bands like Altin Gün, creating all of those- gigantic revival right now,

Balthazar: the Anatolian Music Revival project.

And there’s also a lot of Turkish artists right now also doing that thing. Gaye Su Akyol, which I really recommend to people.

Ryan: I think they just put out one last year that is beautiful.

Balthazar: She’s so relevant and contemporary right now. She’s been around a little longer than us, but I love all that stuff.

And Altin Gün, of course, thank you for making that music relevant. I think we’re all going through the same thing, millennial people, younger people, reaching out to this music that’s now available because of the internet. And just digging it and it speaks for the music.

Some music ages better than others.

Ryan: It’s really interesting to see like a lot of crate digging having an influence on some modern stuff. I mean, looking into the Molam scene from Thailand, that taxi driver music, that psychedelia that was prominent back then that a bunch of crate diggers started finding more recently and revitalizing. Then you have like Khruangbin-

Balthazar: You know, that’s how they came about. They started looking at a blog of Thai music. And so it’s all very internet dependent. And that’s why I think we’re in a very interconnected global world. And the music reflects that.

Ryan: It’s so cool to see how music just kind of transcends borders and cultures and is constantly evolving and changing into new and beautiful things. I love that about music.

Balthazar: We’re really excited to just be a little grain of sand in the middle of that cosmic change.

[Transition Music]

Ryan: You’re not just playing shows in Colombia. You’re about- I mean, as we’re talking, as we’re recording this, you’re about to go on a pretty pretty hefty tour. You got a bunch of dates in the US and then you go into Europe. Have you done a lot of global touring before? What’s that been been like for you?

Balthazar: We’ve been focusing on the US. It feels like that’s our main audience and we love it. And I feel very much at home in the US just as much as I am at home in Colombia. We started getting our foothold there thanks to SXSW.

And because of SXSW, we started meeting up with what would be our future team, our current label, the label that we work with. And little by little it’s been scaling up, but we haven’t stopped visiting the US since our first SXSW iteration. We’ve already done 22, 23, and now this will be our third SXSW. And we always take advantage of that.

Ryan: And so will this be your first year playing in Europe in April. Is this your first time in Europe?

Balthazar: Yeah, this will be our first time in Europe.

Ryan: Are there any festivals coming up that you’re playing? Are there any bands that you’re playing with?

Balthazar: Yeah, the X2. The X2 Festival in Valda, Norway, which is like an extreme winter sport interest festival. There’s ski competitions and showcases with professional snowboarders and things like that. And obviously live music. So it’s going to be fun. It’s going to be really nice. It’s like surfing but on snow.

Ryan: Do you do a lot of surfing?

Balthazar: No, I live in Bogotá, so I’m in the middle of the country, literally landlocked, but everybody relates, everybody says it’s good surf music sometimes.

You know, I just ride my bike a lot. This is a very bike friendly city. Bogotá is actually the most bike friendly city in South America. So we flow in similar, very chill kind of ways. It’s not like gigantic freeways, you know, which is cool. It has its appeal, but it is another thing, especially when we were in Houston and such a different city to live by, like you couldn’t exist there without a car.

Ryan: You say you’re not super interested in the music coming out of the area right now?

Balthazar: I’m always listening. I’m no stranger to what’s going on here. I always try to listen to the artists, but it’s just other types of genres that are very strong.

Ryan: What’s, what’s the scene like right now?

Balthazar: Well, other than the gigantic spot of Reggaeton dominating everything and, you go out at any time of the day and you can go to a bar or a grocery shop and they’re both going to put the same Reggaeton song on. Other than that, there’s a very thriving indie scene. But the indie scene is more like a sad indie/post-rock-ish kind of thing.

Here they really embrace that. Like post-punk, New Wave, kind of thing that’s very relevant here. The metal is very relevant here. Rap and hip-hop are like gigantic in the southern, more impoverished parts of the city. They live and die for these rap artists.

But when it comes to funk or psychedelic music, neither of those two genres arise. Other things did, but they, they didn’t arrive. And that’s the music I like. I like my music to be funky and groovy and psychedelic.

Ryan: So how does Cumbia play into that?

Balthazar: Cumbia? You hear it on the parks and you hear it. Everybody knows the Christmas music. They put a lot of Cumbia on in Christmas, in December and things like that, and everybody knows those songs and I know those songs and we can play those songs but, at least for Balthvs, with two or three songs where we show the world that we’re from Colombia and do like a very specific effort in those songs.

I don’t think it’s part of the sound, but we do incorporate it live. And we like to do like this Cumbia medley where we- especially when the crowd feels very Latino in the US and I know how nice it is for them to have somebody from Latin America come and just bring it to the turf.

People feel so happy and so proud to be Latin American. So we obviously deliver that kind of stuff, but it’s something we do more of the live side of things.

Ryan: I feel like this is similar, but tying it back to Altin Gün, the first time I saw them in DC. I think it was their first U.S. tour and I wasn’t sure what to expect and then the turnout- like there were a lot of Turkish people singing the lyrics. I mean, they’re not original songs, they’re covers, of course, so they’re ingrained into- they know these songs and it was just wild being there and seeing this mass of people reacting so jubilantly to this music.

And it was one of the most beautiful, inspiring things that I’ve seen. This band from Netherlands with Turkish members, but playing in the U.S. mostly Turkish people and Turkish immigrants and it was a party and I loved it.

Balthazar: That’s exactly how it is.

We can completely relate to that because the state that we’ve played the most in the US Texas, by far, and Texas is taking us in so well. We’re so in love and thankful to them in general, to everybody. We’ve been in Houston, Austin, Dallas, and Texas is full of Latinos. Half the state is of Mexican or Latino heritage.

For us, it’s playing to our people kind of, you know, but unlike the Colombians, they are very well acquainted as well with funk, with other types of music with psychedelic music as well. So that’s why I think we have so much a bigger audience over there than in our home country.

Ryan: And you’re bringing that home to them. Tying it all all back together.

Balthazar: When you leave home, you become even more like the Colombians that live outside of Colombia, like in America, in the US, they’re like three times more Colombian than we are because they miss their home so much that they just exaggerate some things about themselves.

It’s so funny, but that happens, I guess, when you move to another country, you actually embrace your culture triple. Whereas us, we live here in Colombia, we are always exposed 24/7 to Colombian culture. So we don’t need any of that. I’m actually the opposite.

I’m actually avoiding it as much as I can whenever you know. It’s a fascinating thing about how humans are always kind of rebelling against whatever status quo we have.

Ryan: Anything that we didn’t cover that you want to talk about?

Balthazar: Thank you to the fans in general to, to allow me to just be a professional musician.

I think it’s the most wonderful gift and most wonderful thing. If I had a million dollars right now, nothing would change really. I would still be doing the same thing because that’s who I am. I’m just the guy that likes to play guitar.

Whenever people say you have a million dollars, what would you do? I would just be at some nice place playing guitar, that would be me. So just the fact that we’ve been able to do this as full-time musicians since 2021. The three of us just do this, especially me, right? I was the first one and I’m just thankful to anyone who listens to this and listens to our music and who streams the music. Thank you to Spotify and all the platforms.

Streaming makes such a huge part of our income that I’m extremely thankful to it. And I just want to show this other side of the coin because so many artists always complain that they receive four bucks from their monthly Spotify things. But it’s like, we’ve made a gigantic effort every day in getting our music out there to people.

It wasn’t just making it. And we understand that the platform is there, but it’s up to us to promote it. And for us, it’s worked in a way that we can actually not have any jobs other than being what we are. And I think that’s so cool. So I just really want to thank the new music ecosystem with streaming, because it has completely changed our lives and it has gotten our music out there to the world from the comfort of my home in Bogotá. I don’t have to hustle out anywhere, I can be at home and, man, that’s a great feeling. So just a gigantic waves of gratefulness and thank you to everybody and I guess prepare for the tour.

If you’re here, come to a show. Album four is coming in July.

Ryan: You just dropped Lovin’ which is an EP. So there’s another release coming out this year?

Balthazar: The thing is that BALTHVS, if you see it on our streaming history, we release one, one track a month, that’s how we do it.

And when we get to 10 tracks, we compile them and we call it an album. It’s like, here’s an album. So Lovin’ is like the fourth single we’ve released out since Third Vibration. That’s the fourth one, and now the fifth one will come in March, and the sixth one in April, and then another one in May, and then in July we’ll have the album ready for y’all, and we’re gonna have it on vinyl, and we’re gonna go out on tour in the United States again in August.

We’re gonna hit the Midwest. And the East Coast and I’m revealing important industry secrets right now. So I shouldn’t say much more, but I hope we visit other places like the mid-South and go back to Tennessee, go back to the Carolinas, which we really liked it that both South Carolina and North Carolina and, and yeah we’re not stopping at any point right now.

Ryan: I’m glad that you’re able to do it full time. That’s a gift. Not just for you, but you that you’re able to share that too, and dedicate your time to it. So that’s, that’s wonderful.

Balthazar: I think it’s the way to go. A professional football player will never deliver if he’s not training every day of the week. Why are we the only profession that needs to get another profession in order to sustain our profession?

So it doesn’t make sense. And the world needs professional artists, people really elevate the music to another level. Because it’s completely different. A guy that plays guitar four hours a week or 10 hours a week, compared to me, I play guitar, like 35 hours a week, and it’s going to be different.

You can really tell on musicianship and we should really value the people in our community that really sacrifice everything else in their lives in order to just be good at this. Cause you really have to give up everything. Some friendships, family trips, holidays, vacations, it’s a full-time job. You’re independent. It comes, it ebbs and flows with income. But I wouldn’t change it for a thing personally. I think I was kind of made for this.

Ryan: That’s beautiful. And I think a fantastic note to go out on. Thank you so much for talking with me. It was an absolute pleasure.

Balthazar: It was a very nice conversation.

Ryan: As I said at the beginning of the show BALTHVS is currently on tour so be sure to check those dates at balthvs.com. You can find their music wherever you stream and be sure to give them a follow because, as you heard, they’re just constantly releasing music. You can also hear them right here, as promised, this is “All Is One” off of their album Third Vibration. Enjoy the vibes, y’all.

Ryan: Thank you so much for tuning in. Please be sure to subscribe and rate on whatever platform you’re listening on to feed those algorithm gods. What song reminds YouTube travel show host Alex Hunter of home? Well you’re just going to have to tune in next week to find out. Editing and recording of this show is all me, except for the featured intro and transition music provided by Scotty Sandwich.