When Prince Royce released his first hit song, โStand By Me,โ in 2010, the singer wasnโt very excited about the moment.
โI was actually bummed out when I recorded ‘Stand By Me’ because originally I had released a song called โCorazรณn Sin Caraโ that was this song about inner beauty. It was this beautiful song that I had written and I thought was definitely a hit,โ Royce, 36, tells TODAY.com. โAnd I put that song out, and it didnโt work.โ
His record label suggested three songs to cover, including Ben E. Kingโs โStand By Me.โ He reluctantly recorded the song but with a Spanglish bachata twist and without any expectations.
The song became a hit, peaking at No. 8 on Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart.
The success of โStand By Me,โ Royce says, really opened up a โlot of doors for me, and I realized what the power of a cover could do.โ
Now, 15 years later, Royce is having a full-circle moment with his latest album, โEterno,โ which translates to “Eternal” and is a 13-track record of cover songs.
The singer brings his signature sultry bachata sound with the arrangements of classic hits from the Backstreet Boys, Bee Gees, the Beatles, Fleetwood Mac, Stevie Wonder and more โ and yes, they include that Spanglish twist.
โBeing able to bring certain people that remember the song back into their time, and reintroducing the song to a different generation,โ he says, โI think that thatโs what the concept of this album was, bringing that nostalgia back from the eras of the โ70s, โ80s, โ90s, and reintroducing it to Latin America and to today.โ
Earlier this year during Premio Lo Nuestro, Royce teased his album, out now, with a performance medley of the Temptationsโ โMy Girl,โ โHow Deep Is Your Loveโ by Bee Gees and King Harvestโs โDancing in the Moonlight.โ
Most recently, Royce and Richard Marx came together to sing the Spanglish version of โRight Here Waiting,โ which is included in โEterno.โ The moment was captured on Instagram and shows the two artists switching in Spanish and English as they sing a verse and the chorus.
โI love that youโre going to turn a whole other generation on to this song,โ Marx says in the video.
“I’m 100% Latino, Dominican, and also 100% American,” Royce tells TODAY.com, adding, โThis is so much more than just a covers album. Itโs bringing all these cultures together.โ
Below, Royce shares his insight into the creation of โEterno,โ touring and the growth of bachata in recent decades.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
What are some of the biggest challenges when selecting the covers for the album?
For me, it was getting educated on, getting very in depth with each song. Who wrote it, what genre was it, when did it come out? What did they do? I like respecting the record.
For the translations, I really wanted to be the closest to the original song, as far as the meaning of what they were trying to say โ and then try to bring in my essence to it. You know, keep some things that I thought were key moments, but bring things that I felt could be different in my style or change it up. That’s kind of how I went about each song.
You wrote all the new renditions. Talk to me about the process of putting your personal spin on the songs.
I think it was actually more difficult than doing my own albums because when I’m recording my own song, if I don’t like something, I’ll just change it. If I don’t like a chord, if I don’t like a melody, if I don’t like a change that they presented to me, I would just change it and then that’s it.
Here, I was more forced to stay in the box of what the original song was, because I didn’t want to change it too much. I didn’t want to be, like, crazy change and people be like, “Whoa, that wasn’t what the song was.” That’d be maybe an interpolation instead of a cover. That was really more the challenge, which, I like the challenge. I think the challenge was fun to do things with my voice that I normally wouldn’t do.
The Backstreet Boys cover of “I Want It That Way” is a fun one and more modern. Tell me why you chose that song.
Everything was from back in the day and I said, “I don’t know if this album is about just songs from the ’70s or just the ’80s. What about something from the ’90s?” It was actually my producer who was like, “Yo, what about Backstreet?” And I thought, is that song old enough or is that too recent? But then I Googled it and it’s 25 years old.
I think itโs safe to say that itโs (old) enough to say itโs a classic. And I think thatโs been one of the favorites, for real. I feel like a lot of people genuinely have been drawn to that song, and Iโm happy I included it because I was reluctant, thinking, โMan, is it too recent in comparison to the other songs?โ
Were there any songs that you wanted to cover but weren’t able to?
One of the songs was โHuman Natureโ by Michael Jackson. I had recorded it and I wasnโt sure if it perfectly fit in there. I decided to just leave it out because I was unsure if it flowed. I keep thinking, โWell, maybe I should have tried something else or tried harder.โ
Thereโs so many artists that were left out. I mean, thereโs just thousands of songs. Thereโs so many ways you can go.
You’re planning on going on tour. What can fans expect and what will the songs from this album look like onstage?
There’s no tour dates yet, but there should be a tour hopefully by the end of the year.
With every tour and every album, I always bring in hits from all the albums. I am going a little more theatrical with this album. I have 13 music videos and they all kind of connect. It goes a different way than the traditional music video, so I may go a little bit that route for the tour.
In your opinion, what is the state of bachata at the moment and how has it evolved since you released “Stand By Me”?
I think itโs always been good. In music and in fashion, anything, thereโs always ups and downs. Thereโs always new trends, new sounds and new artists emerging in the art world, in acting and everything. As for me, as a bachata singer, and not just a singer of the genre but as a person whoโs representing it as well, I feel like itโs almost my responsibility to still put that on peopleโs faces, help (the genre) grow and do collaborations.
In comparison to when I first started, a couple years ago now, Iโve seen it grow to a point where Colombian artists like Manuel Turizo are recording bachata. Shakira, she recorded her first bachata with me, she did another one with Ozuna. Rosalรญa sang bachata with The Weeknd. So many artists that arenโt just Dominican โ because at first it was only maybe, like, Dominicans recording bachata. So I think itโs definitely grown into another space where people have been experimenting with it a little more in other countries.
Looking back on the last 15 years, what would you say is the biggest lesson you’ve learned, professionally or personally?
Iโve learned to have perseverance, to just keep going, to keep swimming. Iโve run two marathons, Iโm running a third one, actually, this year. Iโve kind of applied that to life โ like, you got to just keep going. You got to go through the rain, through the fire, through the wind and just keep going. I think thatโs how music is. You got to just keep going and keep re-creating and believe in yourself and creating new ideas.
