Sung in 3 languages, José González’s songs translate well in the U.S.

José González made a creative leap on his fourth and most recent album, “Local Valley,” but fans of the Swedish trilingual troubadour have come to expect no less.

On his 2003 debut release, González stirred international waves with his blend of indie folk via classical guitar picking, a smooth tenor voice and material that combined his own songs with curious covers from across genres. On “Heartbeats” by fellow Swedes the Knife, he took the electro original, full of synthesizer blips and wild vocals, and made it wistfully his own with a shorter, crisp version.

Across his career, González has complemented his spartan solo recordings with releases by his band Junip and collaborations with everyone from British downtempo mainstays Zero 7 to experimental collective the String Theory.

The adventurous performer returns to Atlanta for a sold-out Sunday, Nov. 16 performance at Variety Playhouse in support of “Local Valley.” While he continues his penchant for covers on the 2021 album — doing a version of Swedish singer Laleh’s “En Stund På Jorden” — González now makes his original material shine brightest. It’s partly a measure of a man enjoying life as a partner and father and becoming ever more comfortable as a songwriter.

"Local Valley" features José González's experimentation with drum machines and guitar loops, a break from music centering just on his voice and classical guitar. (Courtesy of Fredrik Egerstrand)

Born and raised in Gothenburg to parents who escaped Argentina’s military junta in the mid-1970s, González wrote and recorded for the first time in both Spanish and Swedish on “Local Valley,” alongside his typical English-language output.

“It was really fun, actually, and liberating,” he said on a recent Zoom call from his new Gothenburg studio, noting how odd it seemed that he hadn’t done it before now since he uses all three languages daily.

“Local Valley” took shape during the pandemic, with González recording at his summer house north of his hometown Gothenburg, Sweden. That had a profound effect on its sound and atmosphere.

“In many ways it was very romantic,” he said. “I had nature right outside my window. I heard the birds, and many times I was there on my own.”

Recorded mainly during the pandemic at his summer house north of Gothenburg, Sweden, "Local Valley" reflects the pastoral surroundings González experienced as he made the album. (Courtesy of Laura and Mateo González)

The bright, sunny opening track “El Invento” is one of the two Spanish-language efforts, featuring his fluid guitar stylings and harmonies with himself. One of the Swedish songs is the bouncy “Lilla G,” written for his daughter and begging for an audience singalong when performed live.

In sharp contrast to the lighthearted tune are compositions such as “Visions” and “Horizons,” which González considers among his accomplished songs to date.

“It has to do with the lyrics, mainly,” he said. “I’m thinking about humanity, thinking about our place in the universe,” said the musician about the album’s songwriting focus. “We’re these primates that have consciousness and we can do stuff like play instruments and sing along and all of a sudden some people get goose bumps. I think that’s amazing and worth celebrating.”

Another change to his writing and playing is that he’s willing to stretch things out more than he did early in his career. Adding to that are tinges of Brazilian and African music in the latest material.

The intricacies of tuning and retuning the classical guitar live dictate how González approaches set lists. Using note cards to group together songs with the same tuning, he “would switch them around on the table and take a picture and that was the set list,” he said. “That’s been a real help. With the years, I’ve found sections of three to four songs that I can play together.”

While acknowledging that fans want to hear his best-known songs later in the performance, “I have some things where I try to enjoy the show myself — the riff-oriented songs like (’Local Valley’ tracks) ‘Valle Local’ or ‘Tjomme.’”

An artist who’s at home touring the world, the Swede is thrilled to return to North America. “I feel like the U.S. and Canada are always fun to tour,” he said. “There’s always a good vibe, and we enjoy good varieties of food.”

González was scheduled to perform in Atlanta last year, but the entire tour was postponed because of an illness in his family. The wait should be more than worth it for concertgoers, though. The singer has written and recorded most of what will be his fifth solo album in the meantime, and will be including songs from it on the tour.

“I still have the inspiration from western Africa, still have the inspiration from Brazil,” he said. “And it’s very folky with the Spanish guitar and vocals.”

As time goes by, he said he’s finding more enjoyment in overall production process. “It used to be much more of a hassle but I feel like I found my format after 20 years.”

Additionally, family life and even more focused recording hours (courtesy of his new studio) will surely continue his recent trend of combining singing in all three languages he uses regularly with signature sounds that first resonated with listeners everywhere from Sweden to Australia to the U.S. more than two decades ago.