Danny Bonilla
Dolores
Kiko Villamizar
These Producers Find A Balance Between Working At Home & Looking Out For Their Mental Health
A bedroom is often a refuge from the negativity we can get from the world. Bedroom producers often harness the power of their sanctuaries to create amazing music. But what happens when that very same sanctuary becomes your whole world with nowhere else to escape?
For many bedroom producers, the four walls of their working/living space can feel claustrophobic, as long hours and no division from their place of rest can affect their emotional well being. This was especially true in the pandemic, when these artists had more time than ever to create yet little respite from the isolation and doom lurking in the news. This made it possible for many of these producers to sit down and think about ways of taking care of their mental health, valuing their free time, and taking time to indulge in other nurturing activities.
Here are three producers from very different backgrounds who have come to the other end with a new, healthier mindset.
Presented by
Danny
Bonilla
Danny Bonilla had it made, at least on paper. He had a great band, releasing albums and touring all over; and yet, he felt that something was missing. Once the pandemic hit, he was given the time to confront his musical aspirations. He did so while also working on his long running project which made it difficult to separate on a personal as well as artistic level.
Through perseverance and a healthy dose of extracurricular activities, Danny is making it happen, and his vision for soulful, dancy, and heartfelt music has never been closer to reality.
For many people, “family” is synonymous with the ideal life; however, not many of those people are found in the punk scene. Somehow, for many, both concepts might seem as far apart as they can be. For Lolita Lynne, it’s a balancing act that defines both the chaos and order that makes her thrive in her personal and creative worlds. She comes from a musical upbringing and now music plays an important role in her own family. As such, she navigates adulthood knowing that the story of her people is intertwined with her own expression.
A.K.A. DOLORES
LOLITA LYNNE
Sometimes a bedroom can contain hundreds of years of tradition within its walls. Sounds from very far away run through the veins of a musician that tries to capture an ancient spirit and release it into the world with a personal stamp on it. That’s what Kiko Villamizar regularly does when he works on music. It’s nothing short of alchemy.
Kiko
Villamizar
If Danny was destined to do something else with his life, it never had a chance to take foot. Bonilla began to learn how to read and write music at age 8, while also joining the school choir. With so much experience under his belt, it was inevitable that he would come up with music that was unique. He never wanted to follow any genre or style guidelines; he cites Queen, Stevie Wonder, and Prince as inspirations for his approach as well as for the kind of sound he’s going for.
In 2018, he released a single that helped him establish himself in the fledgling scene. “Dance With Me”. Shortly after, he formed Luna Luna, a band which has released albums and toured all over the U.S., establishing themselves in the Latin alternative scene. However, with the addition of other musicians, it soon became its own thing, with a sound divorced from Danny’s peculiar style.
Then the pandemic hit and everything changed for everyone, not the least for Bonilla and his bandmates. With no chance of touring to promote any new albums, Luna Luna was effectively halted in the live circuit. For better or for worse, all the members of the band lived in the same house where they recorded their album Flower Moon. Yet, more than ever, Danny was committed to making solo recordings a part of his artistic endeavor.
Living with his bandmates while also working on music with them proved to be quite challenging. Never knowing when one project began or the other ended proved to be stressful for Danny, but once establishing a few boundaries, things took a life of their own. He also took to exploring the music that he grew up listening to at home. His Salvatorian parents would play salsa, bachata, and cumbia all the time at home, genres that he has seldom played in the past. Curiosity and nostalgia helped him explore such rhythms along with his biggest influences to create something new. The result is a funky and poppy mix of gleaming melodies with dance styles from all over Latin America, creating music that will resonate within hearts and dancefloors alike.
Often, these sessions would become stressful and it made Danny consider ways to take care of his mental health. Some of these activities include riding his bike, going for a walk in the park, taking naps, doing yoga, and stretching are some of the ways this producer has made it possible to keep a more relaxed and healthier mindset in the pursuit of his projects.
Once his forthcoming album comes out later this year, Danny will turn a new chapter in his career. One thing for sure is that this era has brought him new awareness of what he likes and how to take care of himself in a better way.
Lolita Lynne isn’t new to the music scene. Music pretty much runs through her veins. She even thought about pursuing a different career before her dad put the brakes on that idea. You see, her father played in Chicano punk pioneers The Plugz—one of the earliest LA bands in the genre—while her mother was a modern dancer. With music all around her from an early age, it was almost inevitable that she would take to the artform, and she threw herself to it with all her passion.
In the years since, Lynne has been noted as much as a musician as well as for her songwriting. In 2020 she was given the Austin Music Award for Best Bassist but don’t let that misdirect you, her formative years are filled with adventures only a punk outfit can give you. Playing everything from house shows to clubs gave Lolita enough experience to venture into her solo career. She first made her arty take on pop under the name Magia Negra before going with her own name, allowing herself to be more vulnerable and express more personal manners in her songwriting, culminating in her album Fool’s Moon. Now, she’s ready to go through another transformation.
Lynne now has a family of her own and it hasn’t slowed her down at all. In fact, the fact that she now has a family has helped her in every aspect of her life. Family life brings its own special type of chaos, one that’s more nurturing than any other aspects of her previous life.
Music is now a family affair for Dolores, who has reverted to the non-diminutive version of her name in an effort to mark a more mature and different way of creating art. In addition to her own solo material, she produces music with her stepson, working on an album with him that will see them try different things. It’s both an escape and a reaffirmation of her process.
Her music now boasts a new kind of maturity that her previous work hadn’t shown. It bears the scars of past experiences but her work is wiser than before; it’s emotionally intense as much as it is more nuanced.
As a way to balance the sentimental toll that the music might have on her psyche, Dolores makes art with clay as a form of distraction from music. She and her stepson also enjoy swimming in the park next door every time and again in between sessions.
Dolores makes art out of her life and life out of her art. She reflects everything that she is in her work; as a woman, wife, mother, and of course, as an artist.
Villamizar was born in Miami but grew up in the mountains of Colombia in a coffee farm, learning the folk music tradition directly from his family. After studying music and theater in Miami Dade College, Kiko traveled far and wide to learn more about art and culture, delving into many different traditions. The rhythms and sounds he learned during these trips are huge influences on him, even as the Colombian music he learned as a kid remains at the forefront of his art.
There’s a healing factor to the music Kiko makes. In a way, Colombian traditional music often goes hand in hand with ancient methods of wellness, something that’s ingrained deep within its tones and grooves. Kiko keeps that tradition going.
Other than his voice, central to his music are the guitar and gaita, both of which contribute to the traditional sound of his music as well as what makes it unique. He dedicates himself to the preservation and spreading of cumbia from its origins to the modern era. The Colombian Caribbean rhythms, of course, have been central to many fusions throughout the years and throughout Latin America. Kiko is aware of this, and while his music isn’t the pure kind of cumbia one can find in tiny towns across his ancestral country, he tries to preserve the essence through his songs. It’s also folklore as self-expression, as his music is intrinsically tied to his feelings and personal life.
His last three albums have been based on the elements, water, wind, earth, and each of them boasts a sound that reflects those states of nature while tying them with songs that are every bit as personal as anything he has ever done. He is now writing his fire album, and while Kiko admits that he thought this one would be all musical prowess and uptempo beats, his recent falling in love as well as other factors have made this a gentle and warm fire, a different kind of element that he wouldn’t have anticipated before.
His music is not his only endeavor. He’s a stand-up comedian, something that keeps him grounded and helps him explore more of the light as well as darkness of the human experience. He is also a teacher during the day and even has his own non-profit called La Casa Cultural which teaches music to low income children of African descent, giving back to the community that gave so much to Colombia centuries ago.
Kiko is in contact with the past and the present to illuminate the future. Through his home recordings, he’s trying to reach into something deeper than what we can hear on surface level, and get us connected to our very essence.
