LA Music Review | Art, stories and advice
Honest and empowering!
Hi JCR, welcome to LA Music Review! Tell us a little bit about you and your music.
Juan Carlos “JCR” Razuri is an LA-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer.
His raw and intimate lyrics blend with hopeful yet melancholic melodies. Three words that can describe JCR are persevering, empathetic, and adaptive. The obstacles he has faced—as a son of Peruvian immigrants, a first-gen student, a cancer survivor, and an orphan of his father, have only made him a strong artist. JCR focuses on indie alternative, folk, pop/rock music. He has been compared to Morrissey from The Smiths, has been called the Latino Sufjan Stevens, and the Hispanic Hozier.
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In high school, he performed with the string orchestra, marching band, and jazz ensemble. He now majors in the Music Industry and minors in Music Production at the University of Southern California. JCR is also involved with the student-run record label 840 West, the Play It Back music program, Teen Cancer America, Blue Dream Studios, and Hipgnosis Songs Group. His experiences allowed him to create music that expresses the hardships and the beauties of life.
Start streaming “Farewell” here:
Congrats on the release! What was your inspiration when you were writing this project?
Released on February 23, 2023. Farewell is one of my most intimate and personal songs to date. I’ve suffered a lot in the past few years because of my dad’s passing. I channeled my sadness and frustration through the production while dealing with Covid symptoms and isolation in 2020.
I later started my songwriting with a single phrase in mind that played the foundation: “Your tears flow out.” Then I started writing about my perspective of my whole family’s healing through this tragedy in our lives.
Despite the sadness, I wanted to make clear that I wouldn’t have had it any other way through parts of the Chorus:
I never wanted to say farewell
At least I got to say farewell
What is your vision for this song?
My vision for this project is for it to be something others who have experienced heavy losses can relate to and find solace in. I’d like them to learn that it’s okay not to be okay. You can healthily express your sadness. More importantly, in any given crisis, oftentimes, other people are being affected. We need to empathize with them more. Finally, there may be something positive you can learn from something like a family tragedy. I saw that in my situation.
What is your favorite part of this body of work?
My favorite part of this work is the production. I’m a producer first before anything else. I let my classical and indie backgrounds mesh together to create this track. I love the cinematic feel that’s present in it. Thanks to the strings and the French horn. The drums, bass, guitar, and synth help level things out to a more indie/alternative sound that I’ve been in this whole time as an artist.
Anything else we should know about it? Future releases?
There’s so much more music to come! There isn’t a specific song I’ve chosen to be the next one yet, but you can expect less of a wait and a wider variety of sonic and genre experimentation. It will all culminate with an EP in the not-so-far future!
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