La vecina cotilla: short shorts, a window and despacito

You wouldn't believe how hot he is. That's how the lyrics introduce the protagonist of La vecina cotilla (The Nosy Neighbour): a neighbour who exercises in short shorts, who leans out of the window, who puts on his pyjamas without drawing the curtains. And on the other side of the courtyard, someone who has found in that window their favourite TV show.

I love how shameless it all is. I don't need porn, the song says, I've got him right opposite and I'm melting. It's unfiltered desire, told with the glee of someone with no intention of hiding it. And the end of each verse is always the same: I put this song on imagining we're dancing despacito (slowly).

Becoming what you swore you'd never be

The chorus has some very funny self-criticism. I've become the nosy neighbour, only a «chiquilla» (silly young girl) would do these things. It's the age-old figure of the peephole and the net curtain, but in a version driven by desire. You no longer spy to find out who the guy on the fourth floor is dating, but to watch him come down in shorts.

There are details that make me laugh a lot, like that I don't go out anymore, I just want to watch him. Or when the lyrics fantasise about him turning up at the door and whisking him off to infinity. It's a light-well soap opera.

And then comes a more tender, almost melancholic moment. The narrator sitting, listening to the ding-dong of the wall clock his ex's father gave him, waiting like a little boy for ten o'clock to come so he can see him again. I find that clock beautiful, carrying all its history, marking the hour of a new hope.

It's a song for laughing at yourself when your heart goes silly over someone you don't even know. For anyone who has organised their timetable around the window opposite. For anyone who has become an expert in a stranger's routines.

I'd dedicate it to anyone who has their own neighbour across the way, real or imagined. And I'd recommend putting it on with the blind half down, just in case.

If one day the neighbour hears it, let him know it's for him.

The full lyrics are below. Listen on Spotify