Today we’d like to introduce you to OMEWORLD.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Our story together began in the year 2000 where we met during an audition that took place in Mexico City where we both are originally from. Rodrigo at that time was looking for a female singer for a boy and girl band he was working with and producing at the time, and I (Paola) auditioned for it. The band broke up shortly after and long story short, we fell in love and got married in 2001; that same year our only daughter came into our lives.
From then on, we started working together in music, from home, 24/7 together all the time where we composed, produced and wrote songs for other Latin artists until the time came where we wanted to create something magical and meaningful for ourselves.
We both love history, stories, ancient civilizations, mythology, technology, literature, the macabre and of course music, so we felt the need to create a mystical world where we as musicians, composers and artists could create freely without limits, and that’s when OMEworld came to life.
Our name comes from OME which means ‘two’ in nahuatl language and Ometeotl who is the Mexica (Aztec) dual creative energy, and that’s exactly how we feel, a compliment, a creative force, a single entity of two, the two that are one.
To be where we are today has taken a lot of commitment, communication, love and respect both between each other and towards our music, but there’s still a long road to walk, yet, as long as we’re together both dreaming the same dream, we are here for it!
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
We don’t really believe in smooth roads. Nothing in our careers was ever handed to us and life does find a way to keep pressing the right buttons in order to keep us moving forward and stay creative.
We can say that when we were working only as composers, songwriters and producers for other artists back in Mexico City, the road did seem smoother though! We worked “behind the scenes” and we loved it, but now ourselves being independent artists and ‘frontmen’ of our own music project deeply rooted in culture, mythology and our heritage where we fusion pre-Hispanic and cinematic music is definitely harder.
We do everything ourselves, we compose, we record, we mix, we master, we setup everything during performances, design our own lights and concepts, contact venues, videos, live sound engineering; everything from its inception to its materialization, we do it, and although it’s very rewarding, we sure wish we had more hands!
Another struggle, one that we have been seeing a lot lately and the most important one for us, is one that truly breaks our heart, specially at a time where we need to think, move forward and evolve as a human race.
These obstacles are not only those normal in everybody’s journey but the kind of struggle that needs to fight to create a change: Deconstructing ideologies, stereotypes, racism and hate, where skin color is still a problem in this world no matter what color that is.
When we compose and create, when we sing and we write, when we research and learn more about the people who have gone before us, when we perform, when we connect with our ancestors and tap into that flow of mysticism, we see no colors, no race… Why can’t people just feel and love?
We haven’t felt personally attacked with our project, don’t get us wrong, but we see many new movements where the oppressed are now the aggressors, where nahuatl classes are being denied to white people, or where they gather and close doors to anyone that doesn’t look like them, even if they might think like them, where hate is growing because that’s who they feed.
We need to stop hate, there’s so much hate in the world and we don’t know how to stop it but we can start with ourselves and our music. For us, our music transcends those barriers, we want to be bridge that helps heal old wounds and bring people together not separate them.
It is a touchy subject but we have to remember that THERE IS NO ONE WAY, although acceptance and love is a great way to start!
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
We are OMEworld (Paola & Rodrigo), record producers, composers, top-liners, writers, audio engineers and singer/songwriters who are in love with History, stories, mythology, music, ancient civilizations, movies, technology and modern times.
Our music is inspired by the myths and legends of the Aztec civilization, where we combine operatic, ethnic and ethereal voices with unusual vocal harmonies, electronic sounds, Pre-Hispanic instruments and orchestral elements more commonly associated with film music.
Having worked closely with Pre-Hispanic instruments prior to the creation of OMEworld and mesmerized by the hidden dark and uplifting tales of our culture, the concept of duality, and the sounds of our beloved ancient Mexico, we embarked on a three years journey of self-discovery and exploration with our album ‘Aztec Myths & Legends: A Narrated Concert by OMEworld’.
We called it ‘A Narrated Concert’ because during our intimate performances, we narrate a carefully chosen selection of 10 Mexica myths and legends alongside a hint of history and then perform and sing the corresponding song specifically composed for each myth or legend.
In Aztec Myths & Legends: A Narrated Concert by OMEworld, the music progresses along with the story as if it were a soundtrack to the legend, and whether the listener knows how each myth or legend goes or not, the melodies and voices with no lyrics makes it easier to feel the music and let the mind wander.
With our epic music, we celebrate the greatness of ancient cultures and civilizations taken softly by the hand of powerful sounds and enchanting melodies into the modern world. A fusion of old and new where history reinvents itself everyday.
Along our path, we discovered that there exists no record of the way pre-Hispanic music was written, which in a way gave us the tranquility of using the instruments as we please in our music. It is important to mention that we are no historians and we do not pretend to give history lessons, neither we are trying to reproduce the music from the past, but only taking advantage and exploiting the amazing ancient sounds as pure expressive material of our feelings.
We are very proud of everything we have worked so hard for, Aztec Myths and Legends was absolutely rewarding in so many ways because we reconnected with who we are and what we love, also, we’ve always wanted to make movie scores, and we finally had the opportunity to work in 2 Mexican films, one which came out in theaters last year and the other one which will come out by the end of this year. We are also currently in the studio, working in a new album called ‘Aztecs: Sacred Roots’.
We are best known for our epic and cinematic music with pre-Hispanic fusion. It’s true, we can’t help but adding our cinematic flare and pre-Hispanic sounds to everything we do, even if it’s not meant for the big screen.
What sets us apart from others would be this exact fusion of the past and the present but mainly our unusual vocal harmonies, where with our wide vocal range we can create different moods, atmospheres and worlds.
Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
Contrary to what one might think, our love for our own ancient history and culture as Mexicans along with the pre-Hispanic instruments and music did not come to us at an early age. We didn’t find them, they found us.
This is very sad but in Mexico, they do not encourage or teach you to love and value your roots since childhood. To admire our own ancient culture and truly embrace it. It is more likely that children nowadays know who Odin or Thor is rather than know about Huitzilopochtli or Mictlantecuhtli.
Both of us were Mexican kids who grew up in a family that held on to very little of the pre-Columbian customs and so we grew up in a very European setting where apart from what we were taught in school about history and Mesoamerican cultures, we knew nothing.
Rodrigo: While growing up, I was always interested in audio and music. When I was about ten years old, I had already built innumerable amounts of speakers in my search for the ‘perfect sound’ to a point where my mom wanted to take me to a psychologist because according to her I had (some made up disease) called ‘loudspeaker-itis’!
Cables and wires were always my thing, without any knowledge, I used to tear apart any equipment and put it back together to perfection, sometimes even fixing them if they had any issue.
I was the guy who always took his guitar to every reunion or party I was invited to, even if I didn’t know the host! Of course, every party ended up in music, where I played and sang and others joined.
I’ve always loved loudspeakers, horror movies and stories, specially vampires, gothic architecture, Japanese culture and the occult. Personality-wise, well I’ve never been the shy guy but I did enjoy staying in the shadows, I was never really interested in the things everybody was, I’ve never been into drugs, alcohol or extra loud settings, so my friends, if any, were few. I was a bit of a loner by choice. I also started working professionally in the music scene since the age of 13 (I started as a Record producer assistant) and that also helped me stay focused in what mattered to me at the time.
Paola: While growing up, I have always been in love with music, but mainly voices and lyrics. When I was a little girl, without any knowledge of music, techniques or anything, I used to hear recordings of women voices and I tried to reproduce the exact sound I heard to sound like them, because back then, I thought that throats were throats, and therefore they were the same in everyone, so I grew up with the mentality that if they could do it, I could do it too. Ignorance is bliss! Because indeed everything I heard I could sing it, and it sounded very much alike, no matter the range or color.
I was in love with lyrics, still am, but back then when we all read the lyric booklet in our cassettes or cd’s, I read them all. I remember I used to sit for hours analyzing and trying to figure out what they meant or what they were trying to say, to a point where I loved explaining my findings to everyone I knew. Critical lyric reading! Then I was introduced to poetry and rhymes and all the musicality in it and it blew my mind; I started writing poetry when I was about 11 yrs old.
I was the girl who was always singing and making my friends make harmonies even if they didn’t sing. I used to record myself back then into a cassette tape with a microphone hooked into an old Technics stereo and pretended with my older brother that I was being interviewed on the radio.
As a kid, I always loved horror movies and stories, philosophy, literature, vampires, witches, the occult, crystals and stones, tarot, mirrors, books, pens and microphones. Personality-wise, I’ve always been very emotional and empathic, I was not the shy one but did not demand the attention. I loved to scare my friends acting as a psychic or medium or by telling them a scary story in the dark. I was never into drugs or alcohol, but more into theater, music, writing, esoteric settings and movies.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: www.omeworld.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/omeworld/
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/OMEworld
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/OMEworld
- Other: https://omeworld.bandcamp.com
Image Credits:
OMEworld Ashley Joncas Heber A. Nickolath
