Brit-Pop recording artist Alexander James Rodriguez recently paid homage to his English roots by putting his a fresh spin on Wham!’s “Freedom.”
The 14-year-old starlet, who has been compared to George Michael in the past, is bringing this classic song back to life with his modern rendition of the hit record.
On the reasoning behind covering “Freedom,” Rodriguez tells Celeb Secrets, “The decision to recreate ‘Freedom‘ was actually media driven. I was beginning to be quoted in media outlets, especially back home in England, as the next George Michael so we thought, wow, big boots to fill, let’s have a look. We listened to every Wham! song, (the album ‘Make it Big’ from 1984 is a classic!) and the song choice was between ‘I’m Your Man’ or ‘Freedom.’ We pulled apart the lyrics on both and realized ‘Freedom’ fit our current times in the world today, and my poptastic audience.”
With his mom on backing vocals and a pretty smooth recording process, Rodriguez also released a music video for the cover, which was filmed at Selfie WRLD Los Angeles in Glendale, California.
“I think my favorite part [of filming the video] was exploring all the wonderful installations at Selfie WRLD Los Angeles in Glendale, and seeing what room might fit the song ‘Freedom,’” he shares.
“The prison was an obvious choice to follow the lyrics of verse 2, but the yellow phone booth area was funny because I am not familiar with a telephone handset, and at one point I grabbed a dangling yellow phone handset and started singing into it. My mum said, ‘that looks great, but you’re holding it upside down!’ We kept that clip to see if anyone notices my Gen Z error.”
We caught up with Alexander James Rodriguez to hear all about what inspired him to choose the song, the recording process, and what he has coming up next!
Check out the song and Q&A below and let us know what you think of “Freedom” by either leaving a reaction at the bottom of the post or by sending us a tweet at @celebsecrets. You can also keep up with Alexander by following him on Instagram.
CS: What inspired you to cover “Freedom” from Wham!?
AJR: “With the exception of my UNICEF charity song, Holiday in L.A. I really tend to release my own original music, but we were looking for a song to come off the back of Bella Loquita my Spanish-English hybrid song, ahead of two very different original pop tracks releasing later in the year. It was like serving the lemon sorbet after a spicy salsa to cleanse the palate. We needed an interlude song.
The decision to recreate ‘Freedom‘ was actually media driven. I was beginning to be quoted in media outlets, especially back home in England, as the next George Michael so we thought, wow, big boots to fill, let’s have a look. We listened to every Wham! song, (the album ‘Make it Big’ from 1984 is a classic!) and the song choice was between ‘I’m Your Man’ or ‘Freedom.’ We pulled apart the lyrics on both and realized ‘Freedom’ fit our current times in the world today, and my poptastic audience.”
CS: What was the recording process like?
AJR: “After recreating the base line for the song, with just basic rhythm guitar and drum beat, I recorded my main vocal. The song itself was quite bare. We wrapped the lead vocals and my backing vocals, then my mum sang all the female backing vocals you can hear. Every high note and harmony is my mum. The vocal session took less than an hour.
The next big step was the opening brass you hear on the song. My mum called her longtime friend film and TV composer Ram Khat in London, who works with full orchestras, and asked if he could record the brass section live. Meanwhile in Burbank, Gemini Muziq, our music producer, was recording his version of the piano live. We were still missing something on the song, it needed live guitars. Gemini called in a favor to Russel Ali, and he agreed to record the guitars live in the studio for the song. We had all our live instruments including a tambourine and rogue hand shaker! It was very much a collaborative effort. So many amazing people worked on the song, for a cover single interlude, everyone went above and beyond.”
CS: What was your favorite part about filming the music video?
AJR: “I think my favorite part was exploring all the wonderful installations at Selfie WRLD Los Angeles in Glendale (big thank you to Ashley and Joleen), and seeing what room might fit the song ‘Freedom.’ The prison was an obvious choice to follow the lyrics of verse 2, but the yellow phone booth area was funny because I am not familiar with a telephone handset, and at one point I grabbed a dangling yellow phone handset and started singing into it. My mum said, ‘that looks great, but you’re holding it upside down!’ We kept that clip to see if anyone notices my Gen Z error!”
CS: We just saw on your Instagram that you will be in a new film titled Replica. Congratulations! What can you tell us about that?
AJR: “Thank you yes. I am super excited to be in the new movie ‘Replica’ from writer-director Paul Tully. The movie stars Academy Award-nominee Mickey Rourke, Alexandra Grey, Jeremy Luke and Jaime Zevallos. It’s an action-drama but has some comedy moments too. Basically, the movie follows Mickey, a character who is full of loyalty, love, trust and selflessness but constantly battles with addiction, self-doubt, trauma, and a heart wrenching desire for redemption. He is quite complicated. It’s set in Los Angeles. I play the role of Young Mickey. I started filming September 5!”
