After a few months of silence on the music front, Joel Deleōn is making a comeback. On Monday (November 21), the ex-CNCO star released a preview of the music video for his single “IDK Y.”
Deleōn first launched his music career as Joel Pimentel in the Latin boyband CNCO. In 2015, Ricky Martin and Laura Pausini helped put him into a group with Richard Camacho, Erick Brian Colón, Zabdiel De Jesús, Christopher Vélez on the TV series La Banda. Following years of success with CNCO, Deleōn decided to depart from group in May 2021.
Adopting the last name of his late grandfather, he launched his solo career in October 2021 as Joel Deleōn. That month, the Mexican-American singer released his debut single “La Culpa,” which blended Latin pop with elements of regional Mexican music. In January, Deleōn followed that up with the sexy track “Coco” that dabbled in Afrobeats.
Following the release of “Coco,” Deleōn appeared to hint at an internal struggle with his record label Sony and his management team under Walter Kolm Entertainment. He tagged both groups in multiple tweets with pleas to release new music. Deleōn was also contemplating dropping music through SoundCloud.
ESTE MES SACO MÚSICA @SonyMusicLatin #WKNext
— DELEŌN (@JOELDELE0N) September 10, 2022
Hola, espero tod@s estén bien. Hace rato no paso por aquí.. han habido cambios y los cambios toman tiempo entonces decidí desconectarme durante ese proceso. Faltan unas últimas cosas antes de poder volver con mi arte, no saben lo emocionado que estoy pa que lo escuchen/vean.
— DELEŌN (@JOELDELE0N) August 19, 2022
“There have been changes and changes take time so I decided to disconnect during that process,” he wrote in August. “There are a few last things missing before I can return with my art. You don’t know how excited I am for you to hear/see it.”
Things appeared to have settled down and Deleōn is ready to release new music. After his fans left 50k comments on an Instagram post with the cover art for “IDK Y,” he released a preview of the music video on TikTok. Deleōn appears to be going in a futuristic direction. With the drums being played in the teaser, there might even be a bit of a pop-punk punch to next single.
Deleōn promises to release the “IDK Y” video when the comments on his Instagram post reach 100k. As of press time, there’s over 63k comments on the post, so Deleōn’s fans need to keep leaving comments to reach the goal.