Javier came to the studio when he(Murakami) was searching for a singer to sing “Siboney” in the film KYOKO. He was the son of José “Pepe” Olmo, who had been side vocalist of Orquesta Aragón, and was a member of the National Choir.
Most Cuban singers have a powerful way of singing. But his voice and singing were simply natural, transparent, flowing like wind or water — a voice that seemed like it might drift away and disappear with the wind or water, with nothing forced about it, a voice you want to hear again and again. This album was published by Shueisha and is not available to the general public — it seems to be an extremely rare Album.
I found this video on YouTube through an image search. When I reached out, it turned out to be a collector and DJ living in Cali, Colombia. The image used here was sent by him. In1996, Ryū Murakami recorded Javier Olmo’s solo album “Historia de un Amor”. I searched for it several times but couldn’t find or obtain it. One day, searching with the feeling of “there’s no way I’ll find it anyway,” I found it on Yahoo Auctions. It was strange.
I learned that his name was not “Jabiel” but “Javier.” About a week after that, when I searched for Javier Olmo, Historia de un Amor came up.
In the comments I found: “My brother!” and “My cousin! He held me in his arms when I was born.” Since the liner notes of Historia de un Amor mentioned that Javier’s father had twenty-five children all over the world, I thought it was entirely possible for them to be siblings or cousins.
When I watched other videos on that account, in the comments I found a post from a cousin saying that Javier had passed away. It had been written around 2017, about seven years ago. The following day, I connected with the collector in Colombia, who sent me a photo of this unreleased Album.
All that day, I had a strange feeling.
-Seina