We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Naga Brujo. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jacob below.

Naga Brujo, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

I think it goes without saying that the Covid pandemic caused a lot of musicians, creative, artists, etc. to either push their craft to the side or become even more inspired to create. It taught us as musicians and fans that the arts are not to be taken for granted. Not only do we need to provide more support to the community as fans, as musicians we need to perform and provide our craft on a much higher level. After rushing the release of our debut album in mid 2020 and enduring the ensuing flop, we learned the brutally hard way that quality and strategy are huge factors in successfully releasing music. Excuses aside, we decided to put all that frustrated energy into our next project, our upcoming EP ‘Canceled’, which will be dropping on all streaming platforms throughout the fall and winter of 2022. We are extremely proud of these songs and the harnessed energy, frustrations, and raw emotions omnipresent throughout the EP reflect our perseverance and maturity as a band.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?

Creating music as a group is unique in that an array of random, nebulous, and tumultuous, events must occur for the right people to align that makes you contemplate if our free-will is just a result of Universally controlled chaos. Our story is no different. Half of us grew up together, another answered a soliciting ad from the cryptic depths of Craigslist, and the remaining Dorothy’d their way from Kansas directly into our laps without missing a beat. After all of that, not only did we have to mesh creatively as a group, we have to effectively run a business together in an industry that is becoming more indie-based yet increasingly mainstream corporate in a truly contradictory fashion. We pride ourselves on being unapologetically original and sometimes that’s too punk for the rock/metal scene and too rock and roll for the punk scene, but who really cares? That’s exactly the kind of cliquey gatekeeping we strive to dismantle. As a queer, woman fronted, and ally band, being inclusive and shining a light on the injustices faced by marginalized communities is absolutely crucial to our art.

Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?

There’s a fine line between hobby and passion that often gets misconstrued. Although music and art can and should be hobbies, it takes passion and commitment to deal with the inevitable struggles associated with turning creativity into a career. More and more “non-creatives” began to understand that after all performances, showings, etc. were stripped from us for awhile, but sadly that sentiment is fleeting rapidly. As I mentioned earlier in the interview, it is absolutely crucial to not take the arts for granted by providing local and communal support. For example, we just played Hot Summer Nights, an annual festival of free music subsidized by the city of Austin with help from corporate and community sponsors, that was insanely successful. It provided a space for artists to showcase their talents for a wider audience while giving viewers a chance to see tons of artists they may have never heard of. It truly goes to show that when the arts are funded and supported it creates a positive feedback loop for creatives, venues, the city, and the patrons of the arts.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

For a long time we mainly focused on live performances and writing new material, and that’s great advertisement and crucial to being successful musicians, but it is only a fraction of the industry. Learning aspects of advertisement, social media, recording, distribution, sync licensing, press, etc. has been a huge uphill and constant battle that we have had to stay on top of to remain relevant. Unfortunately, not to sound too cranky, creatives are being pushed into the clickbait ‘content-creator” realm that feels a tad corporate to a lot of us, but ultimately that’s just another obstacle you have to manipulate to survive and hopefully benefit from.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.nagabrujo.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/nagabrujo
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/nagabrujo
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCzVMaWl-51UDEorztiRk_Vg
• Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2QbleZVOU7kIltO9qyvB8g?si=n6X9ODM8QbKA9zuEMWA7eA&utm_source=copy-link

Image Credits
John Rosales – portrait credits Jordan Adame – artwork