Javiera Mena

Based in Madrid but rooted in the Chilean indie scene where she started out in 2001, Javiera Mena works as a singer, songwriter, musician and record producer whose music has grown steadily more synthetic. Her early songs were stripped back, sometimes carried by nothing more than a guitar, yet the synthesizer soon became her main language. Her debut studio album, Esquemas Juveniles, released in 2006, brought her a wider audience, and much of that attention came through the internet, especially MySpace.

The story begins modestly, with a first concert in a classroom at the University of Chile and demos that spread among friends before reaching the internet. In 2004 she opened for Entre Ríos in Buenos Aires, and by 2009 she was supporting Kings of Convenience across Spain and Portugal. Her second album, Mena, arrived in 2010 with a more dancefloor-oriented sound and the single "Hasta la Verdad", and her performance at Primavera Sound in Barcelona in 2011 drew praise. Otra Era (2014) pushed toward 1980s disco, while Espejo, released in 2018, followed a contract with Sony Music. She played Coachella in 2019 and released the digital EP I. Entusiasmo in 2021.