Rapper Niña Dioz has been slaying the rap game for 12 years in Mexico, proving to naysayers that a petite queer woman not only has the right to be here but may just out-rap you. Now Los Angeles-based, the artist known legally as Carla Reyna released her most personal album to date this past May, Reyna. “Reyna is my last name, but at the same time, I feel like Reyna is when you as a woman finally find your own strength that maybe was taken from you without you even noticing,” the rapper explains. “Maybe you didn’t know you had this power, but then one day you awaken to your own truth and decide to embrace who you are and decide to recover your own power.”
The power she speaks of is evident in today’s Song of the Day, "Tambalea," a fearless feminist anthem recorded with Colombian artist Lido Pimienta and Tijuana-born singer-songwriter Ceci Bastida. "Tambalea" was inspired by different events that I saw around me, from witnessing all the femicidios, massacres of women, that happen everyday in Mexico,” Dioz explains, “where being a women and being alive another day is a blessing, to being a queer immigrant from Mexico in Trump’s era, where racism and discrimination is more and more evident.”
