Divino Niño Blend the Sacred and Secular on New Single “XO”
Photo by Kelsey Hart
The Chicago-via-Bogotá band Divino Niño has shared “XO,” the latest single from their forthcoming album Last Spa on Earth, out Sept. 23 via Winspear. The track arrives with a “mildly NSFW” music video, directed by Ambar Navarro, that blends the sacred with the secular, best embodied by the Jesus bong that the band rips post-baptism.
On one of the few bilingual tracks from their record (the majority of the songs are in Spanish), the quintet crafts a song that could seamlessly soundtrack the hot-tub smoke sesh or the nuns-gone-wild party scene from the accompanying music video. Borrowing some of the easy grooves from 2019’s Foam, they add a propulsive trap-inspired beat and their trademark shimmering tropicalia. The tempo change following the chorus and the intoxicatingly smooth flow put rhythm at the forefront, a trend that’s forecasted to reappear throughout the record as the band moves into more dance-y territory.
The single and video “are inspired by experiences Camilo and Javier had growing up in a cultish Christian church. The lyrics are about rebelling against taboos set by religion with a tongue-in-cheek twist,” explains the band.
Vocalist/guitarist Camilo Medina adds, “I just thought: let’s put the bible and an ass right next to each other in the lyrics. If there was any trauma hanging from our upbringing, we were able to deal with it here.”