Your burning questions about Alejandro Sanz: ANSWERED

Who is that weird guy hanging off of Shakira, for instance?

December 18, 1968 was an important day in history. The most important? I don’t know anything about history stuff so I’m going to say probably. What happened on this day in 1968, you may ask? Alejandro Sanchez Pizarro was born, of course.

I don’t know who that is — why should I care about this?

Good question. You should care because Alejandro Sanz is the best Spanish singer-songwriter that has ever lived, and that has nothing to do with the fact that I cannot name another Spanish singer-songwriter. Whoops — that’s embarrassing!

Alejandro Sanz is also just really cute and he makes nice songs like “Amiga mia” and “A la primera persona.” Listen to them now please! You should also care because he has performed on the same stage as BEYONCE and they looked freaking adorable together.

What kind of music does he do?

Alejandro Sanz sings and writes beautiful pop songs that make me very happy. He writes about life and love with insight and nuance, and his poetry takes listeners to the depths of despair and the heights of romantic bliss. Sanz sings in a flamenco-style rasp, and my favorite songs of his tend to feature a flamenco flourish, like in his mega-hit “Corazon partio” or the delightful “Regalame la silla.”

Ok so you’re just writing a post about some random singer then?

Wow that’s pretty rude. Alejandro Sanz’s album Mas holds the record for best-selling Spanish album of all time by like a lot, and venerable Spanish paper El Pais notes that he has sold a total of 25 million albums worldwide and is one of the most important musicians in the Spanish-speaking world.

If he’s so important, then why haven’t I heard of him?

I don’t know maybe because you hate wonderful things and you don’t take the time to learn about other cultures? Rumors have persisted of Sanz breaking into the US market, but that never quite happened. Ok it actually did happen sort of, though I really wish it hadn’t: Sanz released a song called “I’m Yours” a few years back, but his famous charm did NOT translate into English. My guess is that Sanz watched the trajectory of Ricky Martin’s English language career, decided he didn’t need that shit, and kept doing his thing. And really really, we don’t deserve Ricky Martin.

Who is that weird guy hanging off of Shakira?

Yeah that’s Alejandro Sanz.

Doesn’t ring a bell.

Remember the guy I’ve been talking about this entire post? A cute thing about Sanz is that he is close friends with Shakira, and they did an excellent duet together called “La tortura” back in 2005 that became the first ever completely Spanish-language performance at the MTV VMAs that year. It’s also rumored they have done a shit-tonne of drugs together, and there are videos of them acting weird on the internet to prove it, but I prefer to believe that they both just act weird on their own. Like me!

I’m bored.

Look at a picture of Alejandro Sanz then! He looks great now, but he looked SMOKING when he was younger.

Oh is that some sort of famous boxer?

For fuck’s sake he’s not even wearing gloves. This shot is actually from Sanz’s 2001 hit “Cuando nadie me ve.” The song is about the fear of truly being seen by another person, and the music video juxtaposes bedroom scenes with shots of the women Sanz has slept with (and presumably ghosted) beating him up in the boxing ring. I thought the concept of the video was absolutely genius, as it allows the women Sanz has lied to express their anger instead of turning it inward on themselves as women often do. The video also adeptly portrays the emptiness men feel when they’re being fuccbois, and Sanz’s bloody face is a metaphor for the emotional violence he inflicts on himself and others. It ends with Sanz stalking off into the night in a furry red coat, which is how all the scenes in my life end too.

Why are you still sitting at work at 6pm writing a blog about this man? Don’t you have a life?

Alejandro Sanz came to me at a time when I was adrift. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my life and I didn’t have a strong sense of self, which I guess is pretty common when you’re 21. The first time I heard “No es lo mismo,” I knew two things: that I wanted to marry Alejandro Sanz, and that I would have to begin studying Spanish again if I ever wanted to decipher this singer’s Spanish-Cuban mumble.

Dear reader, I am happy to report that I did end up studying Spanish for years, even traveling to Mexico for a short stint at a university in Guadalajara. Studying the Spanish language and Mexican culture brought me a lot of joy and a deeper understanding of the world. Unfortunately I didn’t end up marrying Sanz, but perhaps that’s for the best because sometimes when he’s married he impregnates a woman who is not his wife and has a secret child that he names Alexander for some reason. (Ok that only happened once, but still.)

Um and let’s see to answer your question of if I have a life or not….I am sitting at work scouring the internet for the hottest pictures of Alejandro Sanz. I’ll let you be the judge of that.

I DON’T EVEN CARE HE IS THE HOTTEST HBD AMORCITO LINDO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!