Residente & Dillon Francis

I discovered Residente a few years ago. My nephew introduced me to him, and since then we’ve become, in quotation marks, “friends.” We’re talking about an artist I had never even heard of before. He comes from a hip-hop world — especially Latin hip-hop — where I don’t really know many of the big names, and he has turned out to be one of the best things anyone has introduced me to. He’s an artist with four Grammys and 27 Latin Grammys, with a strong social conscience. He’s very controversial, sometimes quite disturbing in his lyrics, but always extremely sharp and incisive. His latest album — he has two solo albums, one from 2017 and this one from 2024 — is the one I’m writing about. Before going solo, he was part of a band called Calle 13, but I’m talking specifically about his solo career. Overall, this is a very good album, but there’s one song in particular, “313,” that is a work of art. I honestly can’t think of a better way to describe it. The lyrics, the music, the collaborations — everything about it is exceptional. I also strongly recommend watching the music video for this song. It’s a work of art. I genuinely think it’s one of the best things I’ve seen and heard in the last few years.