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Photo Credit: Daniel SannwaldMiguel sheds light on the complexity of his identity in “What’s Normal Anyway,” a track from his latest album, Wilheart. On the song, he sings that he was “too proper for the black kids, too black for the Mexicans,” and now he’s explaining why the track is “the spine” of his new album.
“It was a challenge for people to understand. It was always a question of, `What are you? Where do you come from?'” Miguel tells Billboard. “And I guess it kind of rubs off on you … and you wonder, ‘Who do I identify with more?’ The opening line is kind of like the beginning — it was part of my personal journey.”
The introspective track comes on the heels of Donald Trump‘s comments about some Mexican immigrants being rapists, criminals and drug dealers during his announcement of his presidential bid. “Hopefully we’re ready as a culture to face it head on and not put a Band-Aid on it in some ways and pacify it in some ways,” Miguel adds of the issues raised by the response to Trump’s comments.
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