For his new album Mosca, Mexican musician Nsqk embraced the desire for greatness as his thesis while delving into the horrors of the modern world that Czech author Franz Kafka foreshadowed in his masterpiece The Metamorphosis, published 110 years ago.
It was 2024, and Rodrigo Torres (his real name) had just moved in with his partner to an apartment in the northern city of Monterrey when, as he tells Billboard Español, an unexpected plague of flies invaded their home.
“There were flies, big, cemetery-like, very ugly ones, and at first I didn’t think much of it, until three, four, five started appearing each day. I began to get scared,” he recalls. “I felt like I was living in a horror movie. We weren’t messy people, and we couldn’t find an apparent reason for their presence.” So, at his manager’s suggestion, he agreed to see a shaman.
“The shaman told me that someone had done a spell on me, and that these types of witchcraft manifest as plagues,” he says. After a session with that man, Nsqk (pronounced like the chocolate powder brand) says he returned to his apartment, “and surprisingly, there were no flies anymore.”
With the plague gone, the musician entered a period of reflection. He says he compared the process artists go through when achieving fame to the transformation experienced by Kafka’s protagonist, Gregor Samsa. “It’s a metamorphosis,” he notes. “If it’s not controlled, it can become grotesque and unrecognizable.”
The changes Nsqk underwent during this time also led him to experience artistic evolution of new dimensions, making Mosca his most ambitious and accomplished album yet — one that promises to put him in the international spotlight by expanding his creative universe and challenging the boundaries of alternative music.
“I’m trying to bring other sounds to the table, more daring lyrics, and that stems from the fear of not meeting expectations, but transformed,” he explains about his new LP, released on Oct. 15. “As an artist, and with my team, we wanted to create something completely new, with the aim of not settling for what’s sufficient but always delivering quality.”
Musically, Mosca — which follows his 2024 album ATP — finds Nsqk exploring rock like never before in his repertoire, with guitars and distortion that evokes the arrogance, aggression and rejection ambition provokes in those unfamiliar with the pursuit. The 17-track album also delves into other genres, like electronic, urban, hip-hop and pop.
This spirit of collaboration and sonic metamorphosis comes with a series of star-studded guests: Julieta Venegas on “Estar Así Siempre,” Kevin Kaarl on “Circo,” Eslabón Armado on “Mil Problemas,” Nina Minguez on “tuffluv,” Jean Dawson on “Dientes de Fierro” and Riosse on “Lo Tuvimos Pero Ya No Está.”
“As with Julieta Venegas, I really connected with Eslabón Armado,” Nsqk says. “All of us are of Mexican origin and raised in the U.S., and that puts you in a cultural limbo where you’re not American enough for Americans, nor Mexican enough for Mexicans.”
This new era will also bring an extensive tour for Nsqk across Mexico and the United States, including his debut at Mexico City’s iconic Estadio GNP Seguros on Jan. 23. The U.S. leg of the Mosca World Tour will kick off on May 11 in Chicago, with stops in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Miami, Houston, Austin and San Francisco. Additional shows have been added in Chicago and Texas due to high ticket demand. The tour will also include performances at Irving Plaza in New York City (May 16), Cine El Rey in McAllen, Texas (May 30) and El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles (June 8).
Prior to the U.S. tour, the artist will bring his show to Mexican cities with the help of production company Apodaca, including in Saltillo, Torreón, Hermosillo, San Luis Potosí, Tlaxcala and Veracruz, among others. The Estadio GNP Seguros show is produced by Ocesa.
“I feel very blessed for the opportunity, very grateful,” Nsqk says. “We want people to feel like they’ve experienced something historic at that show.”
