Release Date: 31 October 2025
Song Count: 11
Rating: 7.4/10
Description:
Treading personally unfamiliar territory in the vast but often overlooked galaxy of non-English music, Paradís is a newly published album from rising artist Júlia Colom that blends so many tides and winds of music into one storming tornado that blows off roofs with its immense ambitions and bold strokes. A carefully crafted piece of music and one that firmly holds its roots in the culture of Júlia Colom's home of Mallorca, Spain, Paradís is far from afraid to showcase all of itself to the wider world, refusing conformity in any name of reaching for wider success and instead choosing to preserve its self-defined soundscape and identity.
What you can expect going into this project is a taste of traditional Spanish music with the trusty melodic sounds of the acoustic guitar, combined with electronic sonical influences and mixing as well as a pop-like flair to every song - a hotpot of Colom's national origins receiving authentic musical representation alongside a stylistic direction friendly to a wide listenerbase to create one cohesive album. The tones and waves of Júlia's gentle and gliding voice radiate through every single track, finding themselves backed by the songs' instrumental compositions and rare accompanying vocals; the album accrues with the daringness to commit to a truly unique style to themselves and going through with that commitment every step of the way up until the final millisecond setting a full stop on it all.
Particularly the second half of the album has a collection of beautiful tracks that either lean fully into the traditional side of the album's full spectrum of genres, or manage to strike such a spectacular balance between said side and the modern-sounding elegance weaving into each other that it absolutely awes the listener. Individual tracks to highlight are "Transformacions", "Sa Madonna", "Gelosies" and "Més avall" - the latter two being in such tough contention as the personal favourite of mine that it is frankly impossible to decide which one I prefer.
Overall, Paradís was an inspiring dive into a very unfamiliar and worldwide underappreciated type of music that is most certainly worthy of receiving more attention and recognition. It's not an album I am super likely to return to myself aside from the two songs that stuck out the most, though as with many things, predicting the future in that regard is but a Sisyphean effort, and the album may become a work that grows on me further over time. One thing I can definitely say, however, is that I am more than glad to have discovered this!