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Celebrated Belgo-Argentinian trap artist BHAVI had quite the year in 2025, releasing not one, but two albums: “BHAVILONIA” and “NO TE ENAMORES DE UN ARTISTA.” Two albums that, much like yin and yang, “couldn’t exist without each other” according to BHAVI. As we have an online call, I can see him walking around his city Buenos Aires, to which he tells me that he “can’t sit still and he likes talking to his therapist and friends this way because he feels like he is just taking a walk with them”. 

As we “walk” he tells me about “NO TE ENAMORES DE UN ARTISTA,” which started as many great albums have: with a break-up. Yet, this project is less about grief and more about giving a piece of advice. In this project, BHAVI reveals a truth known to those who make art and those who have fallen in love with artists: that there will always be a third in your relationship - art. For him, music is his first-love and his track-record is proof. With stacked collaborations, projects where he has helped behind the scenes and others where he has taken the front seat; it is clear that for him music will always win. 

Enlisting collaborations from renowned artists like Alemán, Kid Keo and Salastkabron, BHAVI co-produced this highly collaborative album, travelling to each artist’s country to record them and discuss their shared feelings along the way.” I think they all went through that in some way, so I think that when I told them it hit close to home, they also found it a fun concept,” says BHAVI. The album shows a new side to BHAVI, where he has infused irony into every bar - acting like himself, but also playing into stereotypes associated with artists.

In this interview we dive into the making of “NO TE ENEMAORES DE UN ARTISTA,”  the magic of collaboration, risking it all for promo and BHAVI’s cross-continental trajectory into finding his sound.

OnesToWatch: Hola Bhavi. How are you?

BHAVI: I’m doing good! I just wrapped up my tour, so I’m enjoying being in Buenos Aires.

Dany Waizel: That’s so cool. I heard tour was amazing. Since we're wrapping up the year, looking back, what were the best moments of 2025 for you?

In the first album I dropped this year, “BHAVILONIA”, I dropped a song with Jorge Drexler, who has been my idol since I was like six years old. I used to live in Uruguay where he’s from and when I was around eight years old, Jorge won an Oscar - it was such a big deal and I started listening to him a lot - and now he’s on my album.

It's crazy that you get to work with your idol.

He really has adopted me and taught me a lot. He has also sent me feedback on my latest album and I’m just so blessed to know him. Aside from that, it’s crazy that I dropped two albums this year. I am so tired, but so proud and especially grateful to have a lot of people around me that love me - we have accomplished a lot.

Yeah, dropping to albums in one year is a crazy feat. I actually want to get into that more because you dropped your second album “NO TE ENAMORES DE UN ARTISTA” or “DON’T FALL IN LOVE WITH AN ARTIST” and I think it's a very loaded name and you can read a lot into it. Why did you choose to name your album that way?

So, the first album I dropped this year “BHAVILONIA” is a very lovey dovey, emotional album. The album logo is actually a heart-shaped remake of the Brussel’s Coat of Arms, because I was born in Brussels. However, this second album “NO TE ENAMORES DE UN ARTISTA” is a bit different. I had a breakup recently and one of the last things I told her was like “you shouldn't fall in love with an artist”. That was the starting point of the album and it became a concept, which is also meant to be a bit ironic.

So it's like the two albums are yin and yang. The first one is more spiritual or delicate, whilst the other is more raw and rock and roll.

Basically, there wouldn’t be “NO TE ENAMORES DE UN ARTISTA” without “BHAVILONIA”?

Exactly! One came after the other and was very natural. I'm a very chill guy, so some albums are way closer to the person and some albums are just closer to just like a concept. I take my music like a movie and sometimes the character that you play is closer to you and sometimes it's further away. 

If I can ask: When you broke up and ended your relationship and said “you shouldn’t fall in love with an artist” - why did you say that?

I think it’s hard if you're not an artist to be with one. Artists are in their own lane and they have a big love that sometimes comes before you : their art. I've been making music since I'm 13. It's my first love and if my partner doesn’t understand that, and tries to compete with that, they're going to lose every time. Of course, it’s possible to date an artist, but it requires a lot of balance.

You have to let an artist be free, you know? There are no set hours, you have to be where you have to be and it's a very lonely life if you decide to really do it forever. I have a lot of love for somebody that I choose as a partner, but it can be hard to understand and date an artist because you aren’t jumping into the abyss every f*cking day like we do. So honestly when I said it to her, it was kind of meant as a suggestion. 

Thank you for sharing, I completely understand what you are saying, the music industry can be so hectic and you need someone who can deal with that. You said the progression between albums was very natural, but I was wondering how you put two great bodies of work together in the space of a year.

I actually have a lot of music stacked up, that I then organized by project and found the perfect features for. Honestly though, both albums were more or less made at the same time. When you are in the studio six hours each day doing a project, sometimes you need a switch up or to have some fun in the middle of the session. It was essentially like having two sessions in one go, so I would do like a couple hours of “BHAVILONIA” and then do random stuff until eventually after my breakup I found the concept of the new album. 

Wow. So that was really the turning point. 

Basically when I told my ex “don’t fall in love with an artist” and she reacted with "damn, that's cold” - I took that and I knew I wanted it to be very collaborative. I spoke to each artist and when I told them the concept they got really into it. 

You do have an insane amount of features on this album and only one song is featureless. Why were you so keen on making it collaborative? 

Well, at the beginning the album was completely the opposite, it was just me. I produce most of the songs I mix, I engineer, I do a lot of everything, but when I add a lot of features, sometimes people say I’m lazy or whatever, but it’s actually the opposite - I do a lot of work that people don’t get to see. Especially with this album where the concept is not falling for an artist, I thought it would be great to involve a bunch of artists that I care about and hear about their experience.

Wow, I really get that. So much of music-making often remains invisible to the public. When you explained the concept of the album to the artists you collaborated with did they relate to it?

Yes! I think they all went through that in some way, so I think that when I told them it hit close to home, but they also found it a fun concept. I think what I liked most was that it wasn’t a label asking them to feature, it was me. I was also the engineer for the whole album, so I got to travel and record each artist in their country and we would even video record the sessions to turn them into promo videos. Overall though, it’s a deep album, but it’s also simple and fun - I really love it.

I wanted to dive into some of the lyrics. There were a few songs that I was reading through and the lyrics struck me. In “TAMO ACTIVO” you say “Humildad es ante todo, por lo meno' intento. Pero soy rapero, quiero Maserati en mi estacionamiento”. In English that means “Humility before everything, at least I’m trying, but I’m a rapper, I want a Maserati in my parking lot”. You were telling me about the album being a bit ironic and I was wondering if here you were trying to allude to stereotypes or ideas of what a musician should be? 

Yeah, I mean I'm just an honest person. It’s both literal and ironic, and I don't feel having expensive things doesn't make you less of a humble person, you can be both. The ironic part is in saying that I would want something expensive because I’m a rapper, you can have any job and still want a Maserati (laughs). 

Fair enough. I wanted to ask about another song “OFICIO”, I think it’s one of my favorites and dissects some of the highs and lows of your career - like “I’ve been through sh*t, but I’m still here”.

Yeah, that's one of my favorite songs also. It's also with Pablo Chill-E, who is a legend. He is so honest and in an industry that can sometimes be artificial, it is important to be honest because people can see right through things that aren’t real. Honestly his verse came about so simply and he did it so fast like crazy late at night, so I love it. The song, though, is a reflection of artist life. You have to make sacrifices, leave your country, leave your family - which is in a way what created the concept of the album. 

That is hard hitting, but true. When you started entering the hip hop and the trap scene did you ever feel a certain pressure to be a certain way and to belong?

No, I feel like that's the easiest part for me. I'm always myself and that's what gives me power. Of course if you're a lot of time in one place you start like you know gravitating more toward certain things. At the core, I’m always me though. I just have a lot of talent , I'm very intuitive and I am what I am. I also love to help people and that's always helped me in my journey to help other ones in their journeys.

I can definitely see that based on all the collabs you do. Speaking of which, how has your journey into music been? 

I was like 12 when I moved to Mar del Plata in Argentina and I started making music there. At 15-16 I dropped my first album and I was also doing random stuff with producers. I then went back to Belgium, where I’m from and I was an engineer and I did a couple albums for kit K1D and Dutch Norris.I was just in the background and it just helped me get in the front. 

When I got back to Buenos Aires my crazy producer friends had started producing these artists that got massive when I was living in Belgium. All of them knew me from all the stuff I did before and asked me to join in, so that's when I also decided to stop making music in English and completely switched to Spanish. I got to collaborate with these insane artists like ECI and the growth was so fast and I kept going, doing albums, and started touring - it was crazy, but also so natural.

That is quite the journey. Congratulations! I wanted to ask about the promo you did for this album. You did something that got people talking a lot, how did you get the idea?

Yeah, so I did a bunch of photos of me naked (you can’t see anything inappropriate) and the concept was like “my phone got hacked and they leaked these photos”. I think that I wanted to do something shocking and also make a very strong statement about society, like why is it such a big deal to have photos of a naked rapper you know? 

So, it was kind of like a social experiment and people definitely reacted to it even though for me it wasn’t such a big deal. It started with that and then I just took it the whole way without telling anyone, so the reaction was really crazy. It was very much staged though, I can promise my phone wasn’t leaked (laughs).

I also wanted to ask about your cover art you've had in your previous albums and I realized this is the first one where you've actually put a photo of yourself instead of a drawing, so it feels more vulnerable.

Yeah, it’s true that it’s the first time I do that. Honestly, it just happened and I was a bit scared of the change, but as an artist you have to switch it up. All my album covers before this one were all made by Nico Di Mattia, a big comic book artist from Argentina, but for this picture we had a concept of a girl grabbing my face and me being tired of it, but we didn’t put too much thought into it.

Okay very cool, it’s very good indeed to switch it up sometimes. I have one final question. Who are some of your OnesToWatch? 

SALASTKBRON, we collaborated on “TAMO ACTIVO”, he’s so young and is going to go so far. Then there's this guy called Asterisco that's super good. There is also Ramma who I did “KARMA” with.

Amazing, I’ll have to listen to them more. Muchas gracias BHAVI, dankjewel and I’ll see you around Belgium.

I have plans to come and make music there soon, so for sure. Thank you so much. 

* Interview has been edited for length and clarity