Sin Tiempo Para Bailar Lyrics in English by Íñigo Quintero, Javi Chapela
Coartada is a Spanish word for "alibi". It's a legal term you wouldn't expect to hear in a pop song, which makes it a unique and intriguing word to learn.
In the lyrics, Íñigo Quintero sings, "No tengo coartada, borré las pisadas" (I have no alibi, I erased the footprints). He uses this word metaphorically to express a feeling of being caught in his emotions with no excuse or way to escape the past, adding a layer of drama and mystery to the song.
Spanish singer Íñigo Quintero teams up with Javi Chapela for a track that sounds like running out of breath before you can fix a mess. Right from the start, he borrows a famous war phrase with "sin novedad en el frente" ("all quiet on the Western Front"), but his head is in chaos. He admits he thought he was brave until this person showed up. The villain in this story is practically a phantom: "eres inmortal, sobrenatural" ("you are immortal, supernatural"), someone who never plays fair and refuses to drop their mask ("nunca vas de cara, no te quitas el disfraz"). In Spanish, ir de cara literally means to go with your face forward, an everyday idiom for acting honest and straightforward. Here, the other person does the exact opposite, leaving the narrator stuck with an actual sword driven into his side: "con la espada clavada, no me dices nada" ("with the sword stuck in me, you tell me nothing").
Instead of groveling forever, the song turns a corner halfway through. He wipes his tracks ("borré las pisadas") like someone fleeing a crime scene with no alibi ("no tengo coartada"), and decides he is done wallowing. He wants to build "una mejor versión que consiguió matar la pena" ("a better version that managed to kill the grief"). The title line, "sin tiempo para bailar" ("no time to dance"), hits hard because it treats happiness and moving freely like luxuries he simply ran out of hours to afford. He packs away the old kisses into a freezing winter that will never come back ("en aquel invierno que no volverá jamás"), turning this whole track into a punchy, sharp exit door out of an addiction he had to break.
