*2024 repress* Helado Negro’s This Is How You Smile freely flickers between clarity and obscurity, past and present geographies, bright and unhurried seasons. A landmark release, This Is How You Smile embraces a personal and universal exploration of aura – seen, felt, and emitted – and showcases Roberto Carlos Lange’s breezy, beautiful songwriting at its absolute best. Helado Negro’s 2016 album Private Energy, re-released as Private Energy (Expanded) in 2017, is an urgent affirmation of self-love and solidarity driven by Lange’s personal response to sanctioned violence towards people of color. The widely embraced album furthered the artist’s visibility beyond a community of fans long established through a rigorous recording and touring career, with moments like “Young, Latin and Proud” and “It’s My Brown Skin” aligning with a larger social demand for basic rights amongst marginalized people and the universal imperative to love, be loved, and thrive.
