Coraje literally means “courage,” but in this song it has a different meaning: intense anger, frustration, or emotional pain. The singer wants to get drunk to quitarse este coraje, or “get rid of this heartache and rage,” making it a memorable example of how one Spanish word can have contrasting meanings depending on context.
“Estoy sentado aquí” means “I’m sitting here,” and that simple image gives the song its lonely setting. The singer asks for tequila and says he plans to get drunk “pa’ quitarme este coraje” [to get rid of this anger]. Pa’ is an informal shortening of para, meaning “in order to,” while coraje here means the anger and hurt he is carrying. The reason is blunt: “La mujer que yo quería me dejó a mí” [The woman I loved left me]. He says the sad life and love do not matter to him, but his decision to drink makes it clear that he is struggling to push those feelings away.
Then the song shifts from anger to waiting. He sits “con sentimiento” [with deep feeling] and waits, saying he feels as if he could die from being without her. “Le hace falta al corazón la ternura de tu amor” [Your love’s tenderness is missing from my heart] is the song’s clearest image: his heart feels incomplete without the affection she once gave him. The repeated lines make the scene feel stuck in place, with the singer still sitting there, still waiting, and still asking tequila to help him bear the loss.
Los Lobos formed in East Los Angeles in 1973, when guitarist David Hidalgo and drummer Louie Pérez, both students at Garfield High School, started playing together. They brought in Cesar Rosas and Conrado Lozano and spent years working weddings and quinceañeras around East LA before saxophonist Steve Berlin joined the lineup, rounding out the band that still tours today.
Their sound mixes rock and roll with cumbia, norteño, and traditional Mexican son, and it earned them a Grammy for the EP …And a Time to Dance. Their cover of Ritchie Valens' "La Bamba" went to number one worldwide in 1987, and the following year they won a second Grammy for La Pistola y El Corazón, a record built entirely around mariachi and Tejano instrumentation. By 1992 they released Kiko, the album critics still point to as their high-water mark.