Maria Zardoya channels the original Spanish lyrics and adds a “different perspective” in the second verse of “Ojos Tristes”
Jeanette found out that Selena Gomez and Benny Blanco had sampled her classic “El Muchacho de Los Ojos Tristes” just this morning. The Spanish singer, who rose to prominence in the Seventies and Eighties, received a text from her friend (and new collaborator) Lucas Bun informing her of Gomez and Blanco’s “Ojos Tristes,” which interpolates her classic with an added English lyric and second verse from The Marias. Jeanette loved it.
“I’ll tell you the truth: It’s beautiful,” she tells Rolling Stone over the phone from Spain. “I heard just a snippet this morning, but have now listened to the whole thing just before speaking to you.”
“It’s a classic cover but she has added a modern twist to it while respecting the essence of the original song,” she adds. “I think they’ve done such a gorgeous job. It’s lovely.”
On Jeanette’s 1981 original, she sings to a young man she’s just met “with sad eyes, who lives alone and needs love.” On Gomez and Blanco’s version, Gomez sings a first verse in English before Maria Zardoya of the Marías takes on a cover of Jeanette’s Spanish song. Zardoya also adds “a different perspective” in the second verse to convey the passage of time: “Antes eran tus ojos lloviendo en otoño/Y ahora son los míos.” (In English: “Before, it was your eyes raining in autumn/And now it’s mine.”)
Jeanette says she was “surprised” to hear the lyrical change, which gives a whole new meaning to the original, written by songwriter Manuel Alejandro. “At first, I was like, ‘What is this?’ But once I listened to all of it, I thought it was beautifully done,” she says. “I j