For the past two years, Bad Bunny has been the most followed music artist in the world. Nowadays, this makes him the most popular artist in the world. He continues to break records and climb skyward, reaching a place reserved for rare, once-in-a-lifetime stars,” Rolling Stone wrote this week, joining dozens of other publications in recognizing that, for for the first time in history, the number one star in the world pop is Latin.
It’s hard to deny. The Puerto Rican musician just filled New York’s Yankee Stadium for two nights in a row, selling a hundred thousand tickets. During one of those concerts, he received the MTV VMA Award for Artist of the Year, becoming the first non-English speaking winner. “I believed from the beginning that I could become big, that I could become one of the biggest stars in the world without having to change my culture, my language, my language, my slang. I am Benito Antonio Martínez, from Puerto Rico to the whole world,” he said in his acceptance speech.
To make sure the VMAs would be memorable, the boy, who in 2016 worked as a bagger at a supermarket in Vega Baja, a town half an hour from San Juan, kissed one of his male dancers on the mouth during his performance. After wearing skirts and painting his nails, he publicly broke another taboo in the world of urban music. Pablito Wilson, author of Reggaetón, una Revolución Latina (Liburacas, 2022), explains that the genre is generally masculine and conservative. “It is impossible to know why he did this. A kiss has the meaning you want to give it,” says the Argentinian journalist. “A straight, cisgender man knows that kissing a male dancer means something important to the LGBTI community. It will be a gesture of solidarity and will not take away his manhood. It is also possible that he is discovering his bisexuality. What amazes me is that it is such a scandal. That discussion seems crazy to me,” he says.
Wilson is clear about what makes Bad Bunny stand out. “We are in an age where honesty is rewarded and anything perceived as dishonest is punished. This comes with Youtubers and the TikTok generation. Bad Bunny had super misogynistic lyrics. He was an irresponsible teenager, as many of us were at the time. And he has allowed himself to be shaped, he has become a more responsible person. I think he was fed a lot by his relationship with Gabriela,” he explains.
Gabriela Berlingeri has been the rapper’s only publicly known partner since 2017. According to him, Berlingeri helped him become aware of gender issues, to the point that, after winning Best Latin Artist at the 2020 Billboard Music Awards, the musician used his speech to launch a message in Spanish against sexist violence on American television. “I want to dedicate this award to all women around the world, especially Latina women and women from Puerto Rico. Without you, there would be no music, no reggaeton, so enough sexist violence, against women, we will educate now in the present for a better future,” said the Puerto Rican after performing his hit “Yo Perreo Sola “.
“He learned about women’s concerns from Gabriela,” Wilson continues. “He knew how to listen and that led him to take up several causes. I think he is a very genuine guy. He adds to everything he produces. Since the age of 12, he has produced a lot of music. It started on SoundCloud and was followed by DJs and producers for a long time. By the time his songs ‘Diles’ and ‘Soy el Peor’ became hits, he was already a household name on the scene. Image and marketing are also a factor, which doesn’t mean he’s dishonest. Once a person told me that the problem is not to build a character, but to build a character that does not reflect who you are”, concludes the journalist.
The marketing person behind Bad Bunny is Puerto Rican businessman Noah Assad, founder of the independent label Rimas. The rapid infiltration of YouTube and streaming services in Latin America has changed the profile of successful artists, now that they are not dependent on record buyers or major radio networks. Trends are set by young people with internet connections. In 2019, Assad told Rolling Stone that the beginning of his success came when he met the person responsible for expanding YouTube to countries like Puerto Rico and Colombia. “I was able to introduce him to all these artists that he was a fan of, and before you know it, he came back and said, ‘I’m going to try to bring you a big opportunity,'” he told the magazine. . That executive gave Rima the first live YouTube monetization deal in Puerto Rico.
Little was known about Rima’s net worth until, in early August, Assad’s former partner filed a complaint seeking half of his assets, which he estimates at $1 billion, half of which come from the label’s relationship with Bad Bunny. The detailed document states that Rimas was founded in 2014 with two million dollars contributed by a former deputy minister of the Chavez government, now a resident of Miami and the true owner of the label.
What is clear is that Assad and Benito create Bad Bunny together. “Noah Assad has the tag and starts working with him. And the idea was to do things differently, to look at them from a different angle,” Wilson explains. “I think it was like: What do you want to design? How are we going to do it? We’re in an age where a lot of people are going independent or without labels or TV channels or mainstream media. People come in differently. They’re still there. Right now Bad Bunny will already be working on the next album and thinking, ‘What are we going to do? What are we going to build here?’ “
The method worked. In November 2020, his third album, El Último Tour Del Mundo, was the first work entirely in Spanish to debut at the top of the Billboard 200. It was also his first number one in the United States, two years after the Korean group BTS managed to reach the same position. Looking at the two cases, the conclusion is clear: the epicenter of pop has shifted from English-speaking countries to those areas of the globe long considered peripheral. As of 2021, BTS and Bad Bunny share a label, The Orchard, a subsidiary of Sony specializing in online music distribution.
Along the way, the same child has become a style icon. Just this week, Mr. Porter, the world’s leading luxury menswear website, named him one of the best-dressed men in the world. He has previously participated in campaigns such as Jacquemus, in which he wore a feminine dress and enjoys unusual prestige among brands.
The musician has rubbed shoulders with movie stars like Brad Pitt as part of the cast of Bullet Train, in which he plays a hitman. The reception was so good even before the premiere that the studio, Sony Pictures, offered Benito his first leading role. He will star in El Muerto, a film set in the Spiderman universe. The film is tailor-made for him, the main character created practically from scratch. El Muerto is the nickname of Juan Carlos Sánchez, a Mexican wrestler who faced Spiderman in two issues of the comic in 2006. It will be released in 2024.
And, at the same time, Un Verano Sin Ti, his latest album, an album of unmistakable pop songs that transcends reggaeton, remains the best-selling album in the US. “They made Un Verano Sin Ti out of 70 songs and sat down to ask: ‘Which ones are suitable for the south of the continent?’ Which ones work in Colombia? Which ones in Puerto Rico?’” reflects Wilson. “That’s why people like the album so much. There is something for all audiences. We all love the album, but we all love one track more than another. But it’s impossible to break down all of Bad Bunny’s success factors. There are many factors. There are many that escape us.”
