Published on the cover of the print SS21 GROWTH ISSUE
https://www.nrmagazine.com/news/2021/4/10/miguel
Why does purity have sex-appeal? What happens when you ask desire to strip? Is it cumpassion or compassion standing there? Have the closed fists of a lover around your heart understood what it meant to pray? Did they pray for you or did they just have you on your knees?
The difference between intimacy and sex has long evaded many of us for far too long as we wrap our naked bodies in sheets instead of awareness, checking our phones before we even turn to see if the person next to us has batted an eye in waking consciousness. When we’re unable to communicate with ourselves or our better halves, we turn to music, we turn to Miguel. The Grammy Award winning artist is known for his sensual ballads. His 2017 critically acclaimed album War & Leisure, debuted at #1 on the Billboard R&B Albums chart and #9 on the Billboard 200 chart. But as we’ve been waiting for our next, favorite slow-jam, waiting to read the lips of an angel before they even part, Miguel turns the lights on.
He needs more, he is more and his cravings no longer can be fulfilled simply by tender embraces and physicality chained to emotion. Miguel is looking for something deeper, looking to fill up space as he is, instead of carving it out of self-censorship, longing and lust. As he matures, he’s been making an effort to become his own friend, admitting to the fact that for some time, the person in the mirror blinked back but didn’t look like the person he wanted to be. He’s focusing on genuine understanding, relatability instead of selfhood dependent on difference and exploring darker tones with his new music because as he says, “there's no way to tell the whole story without actually presenting the whole. I've shown everyone one side of me but now let me show you the other side, too.”
Lindsey: I know you're also close with your grandma who left Mexico, sacrificing her own career in music to make a life for your family in the States, helping to shape your identity and inform your relationship to music and home. My own grandma recently turned 100 so I’ve been thinking a lot about matriarchy and home in general.
Miguel: My grandmother's are almost polar opposites in terms of their temperaments. I didn't get closer to my grandmother on my mom's side until I was an adult and that’s been a whole other, fun relationship to develop that I didn’t expect to have at all. She was stern because she had to be and I only am able to see that now. The opposite goes for my grandmother on my father’s side, who you mentioned. She was always really warm, affectionate and loving but as I got older and business and life made it much harder to be there physically and it just wasn't as much of an adult relationship. I look at family as being a sense of not only your journey as an individual, but as a representation of the bigger journey.
Lindsey: It's like your legacy almost?
Miguel: Yeah and not even as a measure for your accomplishments but just in your disposition, your humanity. Our temperaments, our choices, our affinities are informed by our families.
Lindsey: Yeah it’s this idea of a foundation. You’ve been likened to Prince and been a sex symbol in the minds of many and that was your foundation almost on which your career was initially built. But as you matured, you’re shifting that foundation as sex perhaps becomes intimacy with yourself as you begin to explore these darker tones in your work?
Miguel: I am anything I want to be, everything I want to be and sometimes that is sexy but not all the time. I welcome whatever it is that people need to connect with and I don't control it. If I am sexy to certain people, great, that's awesome but I just know that that's not all I have to offer. It's certainly not what keeps me interested in anything. I gravitate to things that feel sexy but I'm more interested in exploring the subtext of the “why” that is and so much of that comes from the depth of the darkness and the light, the interplay of it all.
Lindsey: It's interesting because we aspire for depth but we don’t always equate it to being anything to do with darkness per se, we see it as a positive thing associating it with emotional growth. We’ve all been exploring this within the past year as we've had to confront ourselves. In what ways have you become more intimate with yourself and what do you feel more distant from?
Miguel: I've been going back to this analogy recently because it's the easiest way for me to remind myself but think about how often the operating systems on our phones get upgraded, now it’s like every couple of months, there’s something new, something better, a more efficient version. Life for humans should be experienced this way, in abundance, happiness and fulfillment. For me it hasn't necessarily been new things, it's just being able to see what needs optimizing and sometimes that means having to discard of things we once needed.
Lindsey: What are some of those things for you that you're cutting out of your system?
Miguel: A lot of fear-based survival stuff, a lot of choices that reflect growing up having to move around, or not necessarily being in a place where we could afford things everyone else had, or feeling like an outsider based on the fact that I'm brown and black. What we do throughout life is to find ways to protect ourselves and for a lot of people that becomes their reality and stays their reality. For whatever reason, I was really lucky. I had parents that even though they weren't together, they still held me down as much as they possibly could. I had enough of a support system to believe in myself, which is really at the end of the day, the core factor of anyone doing anything fulfilling. That ends up in great ways, fueling you and then in other ways, maybe weighing you down.
Lindsey: Right so it sounds like fulfillment to you is synonymous with self acceptance and we see that manifests on the Art Dealer Chic EP series. It’s funny when you realize what the difference between creating space and filling it up as you are feels like. People seem to be gravitating towards this place you’ve stepped into especially with the release of Funeral and the new music on your greater horizon.
Miguel: Yeah I definitely just want to do the work. At the end of the day, an artist is about their work and I want to do my work with as much freedom from my even from my own feelings of requirement, or efforts to tick any kind of boxes per se. Inevitably, when you know your livelihood comes from your art, it's going to find its way in one way, shape, or form so you need to be vigilant about creating clear boundaries. I've definitely experienced those moments where it becomes a challenge to see clearly and remember what the whole point of the gig is and I just remember that hey, I'm here to share, that's what I'm here to do and I found a means of doing it through music. I get to be of service when I am my most honest here in this arena.
Lindsey: Why is sharing so important to you? Why is that your driving force?
Miguel: Probably because of the feeling that it generates. There's been a couple of really awesome conversations I've had with my friends and fans that have shown me to the moon type support and they never really knew me but the connection was so genuine and there was a lot of belief there. I think of those people, and the people who I haven't met yet but that I might meet through my music that I could possibly help to just feel good. That's the awesome thing about any medium - the opportunity to connect with someone else that makes you forget your differences.
Lindsey: Sharing is also interesting because like you said you might not know these people and nevertheless, that boundary you previously mentioned, begins to dissipate and maybe that's the thing that we're all looking for. The work you do as an artist is a lot emotional labor, you’ve broken down the boundaries yourself so that those listening are free of inhibition and able to access the parts of yourself that you’re putting forth in a way that mirrors intimacy.
Miguel: To add to that, it might be that I'm craving deeper connection in my life so I'm looking for ways to build that however I can and obviously that starts with a deeper connection with myself. I've really made a genuine and consistent effort over the past few years to really hone in and check in with myself, asking, “how are you feeling about you?” The more I've become my own friend, because I don't know that I necessarily was, I realize how important this lesson was and it allowed me to shift, transition. I proved that I can write a good, even great, love song, I provided that I can do sexy, but what is that? Is that fulfilling? Does that fulfill me? I don't think it really fills the cup all the way.
Lindsey: What fills your cup all the way then? Even when you say you're seeking out these deeper connections -- what does that look and feel like to you? What is a “deep connection”?
Miguel: Just like complete support, you know? I think that I've yet to really tap into what makes me relatable as a human being. I think that's probably where I feel the most excited, the most uncomfortable and undeveloped. I don't always lead with that. It's interesting to look at the ways that we do our best to stand out and for a long time that was very, very important to me. But as I'm maturing and looking at the world, I'm going that's not how I help right now. I used to champion being “an other” or different but like, we get it. You’re different and so is that person, and that person, and that person but let's find the connection.
Lindsey: Yeah and in terms of relatability, how often is the underside of that the anxiety we all feel working in these creative spaces to shine in an eclipsing but generative way. So much of the work that we do is conversing with ourselves and ensuring that those conversations are healthy. I know that whenever I'm feeling anxious, I write things down on my phone.
Miguel: I do the same thing because more so now I'm not always in a space or under the circumstances to where I can just come down and get it out. To express myself in a stream of consciousness has been a super helpful exercise for me, it’s another form of meditation. There's a lot of people who have discovered the benefits of this kindness to oneself and being able to step outside of the emotion to be above yourself. I’ve also been learning not to lean into my vices and that has been a bigger bigger thing for me because there's definitely an edge that exists and for whatever reason, I'm keen to try to get to the very limit of it to test how far it can go. In the long run, I always get cut some how.
Lindsey: Right and is it because standing on the edge you feel like you have the most clarity? Or is it knowing you can push yourself to the limit to where it becomes a matter of control?
Miguel: I don't know if that's pride or ego, but it probably has to do a little bit with that; it’s knowing how much you can handle and there's the desire to test your own limits. If we’re going to to quote anyone it’s Hunter S. Thompson who said, “life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!” I subscribe to a bit of that, where I’m able to laugh at myself and I like myself for that. I leaned into pushing the boundaries so much because I felt I needed it and it gave me a lot of courage that I didn't have at the time. Then when I realized that there was a more sustainable way of getting there that just took a little more work, I was able to make choices that I’m able to live with.
Lindsey: It’s funny because we think of power as being synonymous with courage but you're so right, it has a lot more to do with longevity and sustainability. What is your relationship with power in general?
Miguel: Power for me always had a negative connotation. Growing up, I was raised religiously and I always associated power with people who did something bad. I'm careful with what power really is because I think it changes in depth and context. Especially in this paradigm, power is afforded by ruthlessness ultimately but personal power is the work you do for yourself, body, mind and soul. Your power is the ability to control your mind and to leave your body with your spirit is a very different power dynamic. I get to exist in a place where the two sort of can converge and whatever power I can afford, all my interest is to empower others. That’s why I’m exploring darker tones with my new music because there's no way to tell the whole story without actually presenting the whole. I've shown everyone one side of me but now let me show you the other side, too.
Lindsey: Yeah if you're trying to empower people, there's an inherent level of empathy involved because to lift people up is to know their weight and carry their burdens. Empathy isn't something that you can teach people it’s more of a personal choice and I'm kind of wondering where do you think your empathetic tendencies really come from?
Miguel: I definitely think that there are a couple things in life that are really hard to teach, I don't think anything's impossible but I try to be optimistic in terms of what humans are capable of doing and becoming. Empathy is a hard one because it's rooted in teaching and you learn through experience with empathy. I think it has a lot to do with your upbringing and what it boils down to for me is a sense of humanity. It’s also this understanding of how to be empathetic to yourself and if no one showed you how to do that, if you never saw that, how are you going to be empathetic with anyone else?
Lindsey: Right and it’s particularly interesting in your situation because your portrayal of yourself has changed most before the eyes of those that loved you the most, your family. As they were people of God and somewhat conservative in their beliefs or values, how did you get your loved ones to accept this different version of you. The world has seen you one way, but they knew you in another.
Miguel: I mean, really deep question and fair. My family loves and thankfully accepts me for who I am, good or bad and not everybody gets that. Just with my value system, through a lot of work, I’m investing my self value in my ability to transcend the boundaries that I felt were being placed on me. When I realized that I'd broken through that ceiling, then it was time to reassess what my value system was going to be in a new reality. Once you prove that to yourself, you just have to insist that this is the part of the process and it should be. Anyone who is really tremendously successful has to learn to do this actively and for me, I’m learning in real time. I wrote a song about this, it actually was very honest in terms of just my experience of having to learn the hard way and it took me some time to rebalance. The journey for me has been about the value system coming from within and tapping into what the real things are that were valuable. Art Dealer Chic is the beginning of my own philosophy.
Lindsey: Right and on that same note, I know, you're wearing your Schedule 1 Concepts hoodie and I just wanted to touch on that initiative as it’s a multi-sensory creative ecosystem that works to inspire curiosity and critical thinking for kids. As you’re trying to change things for the youth, what is your own relationship to change?
Miguel: I've always liked the word flux. Can we stay in that state? Can that work? Can I wield that mentality of being able to consistently change? I think there's a positive and a negative connotation to that word, I choose to really lean into the positivity of it. S1C, embodies this idea that there is an alternative to whatever we're seeing right now in this place, space and time. If there are people out there who choose to explore the alternatives and to embody alternatives for self betterment for the larger whole then that’s proof of concept for me. It's like a vehicle I use to apply my creativity in different ways, the first being the fashion space and how that relates to change. Change for me is necessary. Time changes every second, it's gonna have its effects and so if we don't meet that state of flux, with our own state of flux with our own active evolution and choices, then we're more likely to phase out.