The perils of texting and driving will be the highlight of J Alvarez’s video for new single “Quiero Olvidar” (I Want to Forget), shot in Colombia this week.
The track — Alvarez’s trademark sultry reggaetón — is all about unsuccessful attempts to forget the girl.
Its theme of loss led the video director to propose a storyline where Alvarez’s love interest is involved in a car accident and dies.
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And it so happens that Alvarez had been obsessing about the subject of driving and texting for weeks.
“I’m on my phone and my WhatsApp all day long,” he admits. “And my kids keep telling me to watch it. And I wanted to talk about that in a song, but it hadn’t worked out. When I heard the video was about an accident, I asked, ‘What caused the accident? It should be the texting.’”
While Alvarez hasn’t been involved in any driving and texting incident, he confesses he’s “almost” been there. Will the new video make him change his habits?
“I’ll let you know when I’m home driving,” he says. The problem is, “My phone is my office. I’m stuck 24 hours a day to it. Music has no schedule. So if someone writes me at midnight to do business, I have to reply.”
Just not while driving.
As for “Quiero Olvidar,” it entered Billboard’s Latin Rhythm Airplay chart a few weeks ago and rose to No. 19 this week. The new video will be out in September.