Bad Bunny
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At the current moment, Bad Bunny is on the outs with many of his hardcore fans due to his new alleged relationship with one of the game’s most famous culture vultures, Kendall Jenner. But that isn’t keeping the Puerto Rican superstar from endearing himself to a larger Caucasian audience as he rode with James Corden for some Carpool Karaoke on the Late Late Show.
Riding shotgun with the English comedian, Bad Bunny kicked things off by explaining why he chose such a colorful stage name for himself saying, “My first concept of the artist I wanted to be was this kind of artist that don’t reveal his identity. I wanted to use a bunny mask… I never wanted to be so famous, but then I just went with the flow.”
Luckily he did as women go absolutely nuts whenever they see him (some men too). As for the name, BB said, “A bad bunny, no matter how bad is still looking… cute.”
Well, that’s good enough for us.
After shooting the sh*t for a minute and cracking jokes, the duo went on to sing along to tunes such as Cardi B’s “I Like It,” Ariana Grande’s “Break Free” and of course one of his own cuts, “Dakiti.”
Though they didn’t get into his relationship with the culture vulture, the duo did stop by to check WWE Hall of Famer, Rey Mysterio for a quick sparring lesson (Bad Bunny was the WWE 24/7 champion for a minute) before riding off into the sunset to Harry Styles’ “As It Was.”
All in all it was a pretty entertaining ride.
Check out Bad Bunny’s Carpool Karaoke segment below, and let us know what you thought about it in the comments section.
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Rumors that the two could be dating began swirling last month, when Jenner and the Puerto Rican rapper were seen leaving the same restaurant.
Bad Bunny‘s label and management company, Rimas Entertainment, is responding to accusations the super star artist “illegally used” an Afro-pop act’s song. Bunny’s team responded by saying they paid to use the material in question and, hence, its use in the track “Enséñame a Bailar” was not infringement.
Earlier on Thursday (Feb. 9), emPawa Africa founder Mr Eazi — himself a popular Nigerian singer — issued a press release claiming Bad Bunny used his artist Joeboy‘s song “Empty My Pocket” without consent in the track “Enséñame a Bailar” off Bad Bunny’s blockbuster 2022 album, Un Verano Sin Ti. Mr Eazi claimed he had been trying to settle the case privately since the record’s release nine months ago.
Listen to the first few seconds of two songs and the case could seem obvious. The jubilant rhythms of the Dëra-produced Joeboy track “Empty My Pocket” appear prominently as an interpolation and at the 2:30 minute mark on “Enséñame a Bailar,” where one can even faintly hear Joeboy’s vocals.
“We will not accept Bad Bunny and Rimas denying Joeboy and Dëra credits and a share in the ownership of a song they wrote, composed and, in Joeboy’s case, even performed on,” said Ikenna Nwagboso, co-founder and head of label services, distribution, and publishing with emPawa Africa, in a statement. “Give Joeboy his credit, publishing and royalties on the song, and give Dëra a producer credit alongside those already given to Bad Bunny’s Producers.”
emPawa Africa is demanding that Bad Bunny and Rimas Music grant Joeboy publishing, songwriting and feature credits on “Enséñame a Bailar,” and credit Dëra as the track’s co-producer. Though the statement seemed to threaten legal action, no lawsuit has yet been filed.
Not so fast, says Rimas Entertainment, which is denying any wrongdoing.
“We are deeply concerned by the copyright infringement accusations made by Oluwatosin Oluwole Ajibade (Mr Eazi), the founder of emPawa Africa, on the track ‘Enséñame a Bailar,’” a company spokesperson told Billboard Español in a statement. “We want to make it clear that at all times, Rimas Entertainment has acted properly and has followed standard industry protocols.”
The Rimas statement continues, “Before releasing [‘Enséñame a Bailar’], Rimas purchased the master track from record producer Lakizo Entertainment, listed as the track’s creator and owner in numerous public sources [editor’s note: including Spotify as of Thursday]. After the [‘Enséñame a Bailar’] release last year, emPawa contacted us, claiming ownership over the master. Our lawyers have had many communications with emPawa in an effort to resolve the ownership dispute between emPawa and Lakizo, but emPawa has so far failed to provide proof of ownership. Instead, emPawa has chosen only to send us a heavily redacted contract that did not confirm their claims and only served to raise more questions about the validity of their claims. Our numerous efforts to obtain the unredacted version of the agreement from emPawa have not been successful. It is entirely untrue that we have been unresponsive.”
For an artist to sample another act’s track, they must typically clear master and publishing rights for the recording and underlying composition, respectively. At time of publishing, a Rimas could not confirm whether the company had secured rights use the “Empty My Pocket” composition, but in the company’s statement noted, “Regarding the song’s composition, emPawa has also failed to forward documents to prove that they are authorized to act on the writer’s behalf.”
The Rimas statement concluded, “We look forward to resolving this matter cordially and are waiting for emPawa to provide us with the necessary documents that validate their claims.”
In 2019, Mr Eazi and Bad Bunny actually collaborated on the outro track “Como Un Bebé” — produced by Nigerian duo Legendury Beatz — off Bunny and J Balvin’s joint album Oasis.
Un Verano Sin Ti was released on May 6, 2022, becoming just the second Spanish-language album to reach No. 1 on the 66-year old chart Billboard 200. (the first was Bunny’s previous album, 2020’s El Último Tour del Mundo). It also became Spotify and Apple Music’s most-streamed album in the U.S. and globally.
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When tickets for Bad Bunny’s El Último Tour del Mundo arena tour went on presale in April 2021, his manager, Noah Assad, was cautiously optimistic.
“I thought we would do well, because it was post-pandemic and everyone wanted to go out, but we went on sale without really knowing — and we did it a year out for that very reason,” says Assad.
For Assad, “doing well” has become synonymous with breaking some sort of record. But even he wasn’t expecting Bad Bunny to have one of the most historic, record-setting runs for an artist in the history of the Billboard charts. El Último Tour del Mundo’s presale date became the top sales day for any tour on Ticketmaster since Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s On the Run II tour went on sale in 2018, and the run sold out 480,000 tickets in less than a week.
Four months after El Último Tour del Mundo wrapped in April 2022, Bad Bunny embarked on his World’s Hottest Tour stadium run, becoming the first artist to ever mount separate $100 million-plus tours in the same calendar year. Ultimately, his 81 concerts in 2022 grossed $434.9 million, the highest calendar-year total for an artist since Billboard Boxscore launched in the late 1980s. The tour broke local revenue records in 13 North American markets en route to becoming the biggest Latin tour ever.
Bad Bunny’s chart dominance made him Billboard’s top artist of the year, by the numbers, the first Latin act and the first artist who records in a language other than English to earn the distinction. His album Un Verano Sin Ti, released in May on Assad’s independent label, Rimas Entertainment, and distributed by The Orchard, became the first non-English set to ever top the year-end Billboard 200 Albums ranking and the first all-Spanish release nominated for album of the year at the Grammy Awards, one of Bad Bunny’s three nods.
“I was very proud about that one, especially because it was 100% a Spanish-language album,” says Assad. “It doesn’t have even a verse in English.”
On top of that, in April, Bad Bunny will become the first Latin act to headline Coachella. And, Assad, 32, is realizing some milestones of his own, including being named Billboard’s youngest-ever Executive of the Year and the first Latino to secure the honor.
His achievement underscores not only the growing worldwide popularity and profitability of Latin music, but also shines a light on what an upstart independent can do — regardless of genre or the backing of a legacy company — when armed with guts, hustle, deep musical knowledge, loyalty and the confidence to break rules and create new ones.
Bad Bunny is signed to Assad’s label, Rimas Entertainment, which originated in 2014 as a digital marketing and distribution company. It has evolved to become a 100-plus-person operation with distribution from The Orchard, with a roster ranging from veterans (Arcángel, Jowell & Randy) to promising newcomers (Mora, Eladio Carrión), many of whom are signed to 360 deals. Rimas ended 2022 at No. 7 on Billboard’s year-end Top Labels chart and at No. 1 on the year-end Top Latin Labels chart, with 23 charting albums by seven artists besides Bad Bunny.
Assad also launched RSM Publishing, which is administered by Universal Music Publishing Group and was No. 1 on Billboard’s year-end Hot Latin Songs Publishers list. And while Bad Bunny is his most visible management client, Assad also started managing Karol G 18 months ago with his new management firm, Habibi, with stellar results. Her 2022 $trip Love tour, promoted by AEG Presents, grossed $69.9 million with 410,000 tickets sold across 33 arena shows in North America — the highest-earning U.S tour ever by a female Latin act, according to Billboard Boxscore.
“Noah has an unmatched understanding of his artists,” says Jody Gerson, chairman/CEO of UMPG. “His instincts about how to market and promote them, as he has done so well with Bad Bunny and Karol G, are among the best I’ve ever seen in the business. As an executive, Noah is loyal, honest, innovative and smart, and these are just some of the many traits that make him a fantastic partner.”
Though only 32, Assad considers himself a “semi-vet. I may be ‘new’ to a lot of people, but I’ve been at this for 12 years,” he says with a laugh. A self-professed reggaetón nerd with long blonde hair that matches his laid-back surfer vibe, Assad — born to a Lebanese father and a mother from St. Croix — grew up in Puerto Rico, and since seventh grade has been “consumed with reggaetón culture.” By 16, he was promoting house parties, booking the likes of Farruko before he became a big name and cultivating relationships with already established acts like Plan B’s Chencho Corleone. “Chencho was the first established artist to simply say yes to me,” says Assad, a favor that has paid dividends for Corleone; “Me Porto Bonito,” his smash collaboration on Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti, became the first all-Spanish song to top Billboard’s Streaming Songs chart. That full-circle moment highlights Assad’s reputation for cultivating relationships with contacts to whom he stays loyal. “We work with everybody; we are always coexisting,” he told Billboard last year. Witness his deals with opposing teams at The Orchard and Universal, while his top touring acts — Bad Bunny and Karol G — work with Live Nation and AEG, respectively.
“Noah is similar to Bad Bunny in that he’s also a unicorn,” says Henry Cárdenas, the veteran promoter and founder of CMN, which produced and promoted Bad Bunny’s last two tours, including the stadium tour in partnership with Live Nation. “The guy’s going to create an empire, and he’s a man of his word. I compare him to the old managers, where we closed business with a handshake, and he’s appreciative. Where I’m concerned, he has continued to take me into account, and it harks back to the fact that I worked with him from the very beginning.”
While Assad’s success feels very of the moment — in keeping with his young acts, the relatively recent mainstream success of reggaetón and Bad Bunny’s fondness for releasing music with little or no notice — he’s actually a planner; like his famous client, he takes a long view on success. It wasn’t always this way. As a young promoter, Assad recalls struggling mightily to make a buck (and often getting “hustled”) in what he half-jokingly refers to as “the reggaetón depression era” of 2009-2016, when the music was largely consumed for free and money came almost solely from live shows.
“YouTube was the outlet that turned it into a commercial business,” says Assad, who says he struck an early deal with the platform to monetize the millions of views the music generated for many independent artists and eventually for his own — including a 22-year-old who called himself Bad Bunny. “I didn’t have the privilege to work with an artist who was already established, but I was very fortunate to have Bunny trust me and work with me. Bunny makes me look good,” he says. Alongside his artist, Assad began thinking long term, and even when his actions seem improvised, they are anything but. Take the one-two punch of back-to-back tours with a hit album in between, conceived after ticket prices to Bad Bunny’s arena tour started soaring just after they went on sale in 2021.
“We started getting the heat, but we didn’t think of stadiums until the summer,” says Assad, pointing out that Bad Bunny already had plans to release a new album when the arena tour wrapped. By October, a plan had been made: arenas in February, an album in May and a stadium tour in June to be announced in January with a series of humorous videos featuring Bad Bunny’s girlfriend, Gabriela Berlingari, and Spanish actor Mario Casas. “There’s a lot of pivoting along the way, but we still follow the plan,” says Assad. “And everything we do has to make sense. If it doesn’t make sense, even if it’s beautiful, we pass.”
“Noah is singular in his sense of the moment, commitment to a vision and fearlessness,” says UTA agent Jbeau Lewis, who books Bad Bunny and Karol G. “Noah understands his artists, he always plays the long game, and he’s unafraid to say no.”
Bad Bunny has said repeatedly that he plans to take a break after Coachella, from both recording and touring. But for Assad, the work of growing his business never slows. Last year, in partnership with The Orchard, he launched Sonar, a label for developing acts that already has deals with over 50 artists from around the world, including non-Latin acts. Assad also began a strategic alliance with Live Nation to develop new businesses outside of touring, including Gekko, the restaurant Bad Bunny opened in Miami in August with hospitality entrepreneur David Grutman. Most recently, he announced the launch of Rimas Sports, a stand-alone management company (name notwithstanding, it is not a division of Rimas Entertainment) whose client list already includes the Toronto Blue Jays’ Santiago Espinal and Diego Cartaya, a top prospect for the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Assad says his biggest goal for 2023 has nothing to do with business, however. “I want to fly less, enjoy more and spend as much time as I can in Puerto Rico,” he says. “That’s my goal. People look at me and think that because of the hair I’m from Mississippi or something. But I’m just a kid from Carolina, Puerto Rico, who loves reggaetón.”
This story will appear in the Feb. 4, 2023, issue of Billboard.
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2022 was a banner year for Bad Bunny as he went to achieve some historical feats such as having the most streamed Latin album in history with his fourth studio album, Un Verano Sin Ti, and eventually going on to rock Yankee Stadium to close out his hottest of summers.
Unfortunately for him, scandal struck to kick off 2023 when he was caught on video grabbing a fan’s phone and chucking it into the abyss while he was visiting the Dominican Republic earlier this week. In the video you can see a female fan roll up on the 28-year-old King of Reggaeton and attempt to take a selfie with him. For the first few seconds, Bunny seemed cool with the gesture as he smiled while she stuck a phone in front of the both of them, but then the “Ojitos Lindos” artist grabbed the phone and flung it across the street much to the surprise of everyone recording him before walking off and saying “Respeta mi espacio” (Respect my space).
Needless to say the backlash he caught on social media was swift though many of his fans understood where he was coming from.
Knowing he had to acknowledge his actions, Bad Bunny took to social media to explain that he’s cool with fans meeting and greeting him on a personal level, but doubled down on his actions saying he doesn’t appreciate anyone rolling up on him and putting a “f*cking phone” in his face as he takes that as a “lack of respect.” With that being the case he’ll respond in kind to anyone violating his personal space.
English Translation: “To the person who comes up to me to say hello, to tell me something, or just to meet me, will always receive my attention and respect. Those who come and put a f*cking phone in my face, I will consider if for what it is, a lack of respect, and I will treat it likewise.”
Naturally his fans rode with him and accepted his explanation while others felt he went too far by chucking an expensive smart phone and even said he’d never fill the shoes of the OG King of Reggaeton, Daddy Yankee.
Daddy Yankee has officially retired from the music game for anyone who needs to know.
Whether or not this affects Bad Bunny’s popularity amongst his fan base we don’t know (probably won’t). But just know if you roll up on the Puerto Rican artist with plans on getting a pic, you better come correct or come with a phone you don’t mind losing because Bad Bunny don’t play that ish.
Bad Bunny kicked off 2022 with yet another addition to his billion-view videos when his Jhay Cortez-assisted “Dákiti” surpassed the 10-digit mark on Jan. 12. The edgy and carefree music video, which premiered on Oct. 20, 2020, and was filmed at the beach, marked his seventh entry in YouTube’s Billion Views Club. Eight months later, Bad Bunny’s “Amorfoda” entered the list on Sept. 8.
The music video for “Amordofa,” in which he’s seen performing his minimalistic piano ballad around a car in a beach setting while he’s arguing with a girl, was released on Valentine’s Day in 2018 but didn’t surpass a billion views until this year. The entry becomes his eighth video as a lead, featured artist or collaborator to hit the milestone.
Before that, the Puerto Rican artist had earned billion-view videos with “Te Bote (Remix),” “Mayores,” “No Me Conoce (Remix),” “I Like It,” “Mia” and “Tu No Vive Asi.”
Six other of his videos are close to hitting 1 billion views, including “Si Tu Novio te Deja Sola” with J Balvin, “Callaita,” the Karol G-assisted “Ahora me Llama,” “Bailame (Remix)” with Nacho and Yandel, “Diles” alongside Ozuna, Farruko, Arcangel and Ñengo Flow, and “Soy Peor,” all of which have more than 900,000 views.
The artist born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio currently holds No. 1 on the U.S. Top Artists and reclaimed No. 1 on Global Top Artists thanks to charting videos “Titi Me Pregunto,” “Me Porto Bonito” and “Neverita,” according to YouTube.
Below, see all of his videos to enter the YouTube Billion Views Club.
Just two days after teasing fans with new music, Bad Bunny officially unleashed the track called “Gato de Noche” in collaboration with Ñengo Flow, out today (Dec. 22). “This is to close the year,” he said on TikTok just hours before blessing fans with the surprise song.
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Urbano veteran Ñengo recruited Bunny for “Gato de Noche,” a hard-hitting reggaeton track from the point of view of the “chico malo” (bad boy) who’s after a taken lady. “He loves you and gives you everything/ But you’re the devil and you’re crazy for me/ You like the bad boys and are playing fire with me […] although you’re a sin, I’m going to hell following that big a–/ I’m on my way/ Today I’m picking you up after midnight,” Bunny chants in the sultry lyrics.
“With the real beast,” the Puerto Rican act said of Ñengo when he revealed the collab on his Instagram stories. The pair have many collaborative efforts, including “Que Malo” and “Safaera,” which peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot Latin Songs chart dated April 11, 2020. Both tracks form part of Bunny’s YHLQMDLG album.
“Gato de Noche” follows the Arcangel and Bad Bunny track “La Jumpa,” which debuted at No. 3 on the Hot Latin Songs chart dated Dec. 10, 2022 and wraps up Bunny’s fruitful year.
In 2022, Bunny ruled Billboard’s year-end Top Artists chart for the first time, while his Un Verano Sin Ti made history as the first all-Spanish album to hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200 year-end albums chart. He also closed out the year with a record-breaking $435 million in tour grosses that combine more than 80 concerts from two separate tours (El Último Tour del Mundo and The World’s Hottest Tour).
Watch the “Gato de Noche” video below.
It was a year in which Rammstein blasted plumes of fire from a backpack, The Weeknd destroyed a miniature city in a hurricane of black smoke, Pepe Aguilar sang on horseback amid Aztec warriors and equestrian acrobats and Elton John gave a “Rocketman” tour of space from a video screen that bled into the stage. artists provided fans with endless stadium explosions and other over-the-top spectacles. Even though Inflation and supply-chain issues considerably jacked up expenses for 2022’s biggest tours, cutting corners was not an option. “It’s really important that we don’t short-change anybody,” David Furnish, John’s husband and manager, told Billboard in November, just before the singer’s final U.S. farewell tour show.
And in 2023, stars who continue or return to stadiums after emerging from COVID-19 quarantine are unlikely to scale down. “Our show is evolving,” Aguilar says from his Mexico City home. “Once I experimented with it, it’s hard to go back.”
Here are the stories behind five other ground-breaking concert special effects in 2022:
Bad Bunny’s floating dolphins and live-video merry-go-rounds
Befitting the year’s highest grossing tour, Bad Bunny went big with stadium special effects. The giant dolphins floating above the crowds were the most instantly eye-catching, but Bunny also integrated video into the shows in new ways. During “Callaíta,” he built on the merry-go-round imagery of his 2019 video and projected a 3-D live feed of his performance, as well as captured shots of individual fans and other elements of the show, into the frames of the rotating structure on stage. “There’s a lot more to it than meets the eye,” says Adrian Martinez, creative director for Sturdy, the production company that created much of the tour’s visual imagery. “A lot of shows just use loops and clips here and there and kind of just repeat. We wanted to make sure people were looking at something new pretty constantly.”
Coldplay’s LED spheres
After Coldplay‘s designer approached Frederic Opsomer with the idea for a new effect— hovering spheres festooned with LED strips— his staff at PRG Projects began two months of problem-solving. First, they considered “hardshell with a trussing system inside.” But that could have required seven or eight trucks with a crew of more than 60, which was unsustainable given the band’s mandate to be environmentally conscious. “We have to come up with another way,” Opsomer, PRG’s vp of global scenic, told the staff. So they concocted inflatable spheres, tested lightweight fabric coatings and determined they could fit in a fractional portion of a truck with just one crew member for maintenance. After accounting for rainy and windy stadium conditions, they built structures for the tour that began in March and tested them in factory settings, but didn’t feel fully comfortable until they lit up in bright colors on the first date. “How did we celebrate?” Opsomer asks. “I think we had a big smile on our face.”
Kendrick Lamar’s shadow play
During Kendrick Lamar‘s The Big Steppers tour, which ran from June to December, the rapper hunched over with his microphone, creating a big-screen shadow during “Count Me Out” with arrows wedged into Shadow Kendrick’s back when they did not actually appear in Real Kendrick’s back. “It’s this little photogenic moment that plays with reality,” says Mike Carson, one of the tour’s show designers and show directors, who helped coordinate choreographers, directors, lighting designers and video programmers to make it work. “It’s like a magic track. I read reviews and people describe what it is and still can’t pinpoint how he did it.” (Watch the whole show here.)
Adele’s piano on fire
It was Adele‘s idea last May to light her piano aflame during “Set Fire to the Rain.” That prompted five months of designers and crew members plotting and building a faux white Yamaha grand piano that bursts into flames while Adele sings during a manufactured rainstorm at her Caesars Palace residency in Las Vegas. Those flames spread more than 100 feet across the stage, part of an effect that involves a high-tech fire suppressant and huge troughs of water. The piano, says Paul English, Adele’s production manager, is “like a bath. It contains a load of water, so there’s a moment where [the piano] falls over and the water spills out. Then it sets itself on fire.” The flames heat up to 300 degrees, which means everything around it is at risk of melting or burning – which requires an elaborate rain “curtain” to keep in check. “So, yeah, it’s been challenging,” English adds.
Lady Gaga’s flaming cannons
For her Chromatica Ball stadium tour that kicked off this summer, Lady Gaga contrasted a brutalist-architecture set design inspired by 1920s German expressionism with non-stop explosions. Her “cold, very stark feel” in the set created a gray landscape that allowed her longtime production designer, LeRoy Bennett, to go crazy with orange-and-yellow pyro, aided by Rammstein’s special-effects company, FFP. (The flaming cannons are technically known in the special-effects industry as “liquid flame giga,” or LFGs.) “We’ve always had some pyro here and there, but never really went full-on big metal or Rammstein-style flames,” Bennett says. “She loves those kinds of effects. She’s a big fan of fire and the power and drama of it.”
With its genre-spanning, eternal-summer energy, Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti transcended Latin music and became one of the year’s biggest blockbusters. To one of his main producers, MAG, “It’s been a long time coming.”
“The [previous] divide between Latin music and pop music has now merged, because Spanish-language music is pop music,” he reflects.
The Puerto Rican-Dominican hitmaker helped Bad Bunny create the omnipresent Un Verano Sin Ti. The LP has become the first all-Spanish album to top the year-end Billboard 200, ever, and reached No. 1 on the Billboard staff’s Best Albums of 2022 list. It is also the first all-Spanish-language release to earn a Grammy award nomination for album of the year. And thanks to the record’s wild success, Bad Bunny landed on Billboard Magazine‘s No. 1 year-end issue. It’s not just a chart-topping, record-breaking album, it’s an era-defining moment in pop.
The producer-artist pair have been working closely since MAG executive produced Bunny’s El Último Tour del Mundo in 2020, which also resulted in unprecedented success — it became the first Spanish-language release to top the Billboard 200 in the chart’s 64-year existence.
For reasons mentioned above and more, the super-producer peaked at No. 1 on Billboard’s Year-End Hot Latin Song Producers chart, and landed No. 5 on the all-genre Year-End Hot 100 Producers chart.
Born Marco Borrero in Brooklyn, MAG alchemized 15 of the 23 tracks total from Benito’s latest record, including its two highest-charting tracks on the Year-End Hot 100, “Tití Me Preguntó” and “Me Porto Bonito” — the two songs combined have reached a staggering 1.9 billion streams on Spotify alone since the album’s release in May via Rimas Entertainment.
When asked about the album’s groundbreaking accomplishments, Bunny’s long-time collaborator Tainy, who co-produced nine tracks in the album, tells Billboard: “We never felt these things could be possible for us coming from Puerto Rico and being Latin. We always felt like there was [an Anglo-imposed] level higher than what we were doing, because of the Anglo market. That doesn’t exist anymore, and a lot of that has to do with Benito. It’s special to see those barriers broken, and dreaming big ends up becoming true. This is the new normal.”
“I’m happy to finally see that when you’re talking about Billie Eilish, Adele, Harry Styles, Justin Bieber in the same conversation now, you’re also talking about Benito, you’re talking about Karol G, Rauw and Rosalia,” echoes MAG.
Billboard hopped on Zoom with MAG, who was just arriving to Los Angeles from Miami to be honored at the Variety Hitmakers event for helping Bad Bunny craft another revolutionary new album.
Since we last spoke during the El Último Tour del Mundo (2020) phase, things have evolved tremendously for you. How’s your year going?
We work so much, and every time we finish something we’re on to the next thing. But when I take a second to be present and reflect on my year, it’s heartwarming to see everything that’s happening with Spanish-language music, and the impact that it’s having culturally. What’s happened with the songs we’re doing, how they’ve been accepted and received, and how that’s become a part of pop culture is really heartwarming.
When you reflect on Un Verano Sin Ti’s unprecedented accomplishments, what goes through your head?
The [previous] divide between Latin music and pop music has now merged, because Spanish-language music is pop music. It is the most popular music right now. It makes me really happy to see that. It’s been a long time coming. Of course, streaming has assisted in that — because now we can physically see what consumers are actually listening to, and most consumers are listening to Spanish-language music.
Congratulations on topping the Billboard charts’ Hot Latin Song Producers and landing at No. 5 for the all-genres Hot 100 Producers chart. Did you anticipate these accomplishments given the album’s recent success?
I’m never thinking about charts or the success of what a song is going to have as we’re creating it. I think that’s been an important part of my creative process. Working with Benito, we’re making things that we love and pouring our heart into that, hoping that it’s going to resonate and connect with people. But to have the chart accomplishments, it’s beautiful to see. It’s definitely exciting.
“Tití Me Preguntó” is an explosion of genres: Dominican dembow, reggaetón and hip-hop. It also has an Antony Santos bachata sample (“No Te Puedo Olvidar”). Talk to me about your creative process and what inspired the inclusion of all these musical styles.
It’s like throwing every genre I love in a blender and seeing what happens. That got inspired by the Antony Santos sample that Benito played to me the morning that we created that song. He came over to me with his phone and he was like, “Mag, quiero samplear esto” and played me the actual song. We had some really exciting ideas for it when it was just a trap song, and we put the sample in the intro.
A couple of hours into working on the song, Benito had this idea to try a Dominican dembow section on it, so I sped up the tempo after the hip-hop part. But it was a hard one — because, like you said, we had to cross pollinate so many genres together, and that was a challenge. But it worked. The final product was very, very exciting to listen to.
The song represents you too, growing up in Brooklyn listening to hip-hop, and being of Dominican and Puerto Rican descent.
Yes, [it is] an absolute representation of me. I am Dominican and Puerto Rican. I grew up listening to a lot of bachata, reggaetón, and hip-hop. I love Dominican dembow and I’m from New York. The song has this New York grit to it — I know for a fact that a lot of my people, friends and family back home in New York gravitated towards that.
“El Apagón” has some tribal drumming and ‘90s dance elements..
Benito and I worked on “El Apagón” from scratch. It started with an Ismael Rivera sample from a song called “Controversia,” a song that Benito really loves. He was just rapping throughout the whole thing. Then Benito said, “I want to make another anthem for Puerto Rico.” “P FKN R” [from YHLQMDLG] was an anthem, but it has a lot of curse words. As we’re making this curse-free Puerto Rican anthem, we thought of this ’90s freestyle house section for it. We then threw in “me gusta la chocha de Puerto Rico” all over the chorus [a DJ Joe’s “Vamos a Joder” sample] with Gabriela [Berlingeri] singing in the outro, which was the cherry on top.
Everything in the lyrics is an ode to Puerto Rico, and the situation that’s happening there. To hear it everywhere when I was in Puerto Rico got me really emotional. It really felt like an anthem for our people to see that there’s a lot of street graffiti with the lyrics around Puerto Rico.
Has this genre-spanning approach changed your perspective on producing music? Searching sounds from within your culture, but also seeking external and perhaps previously-unfamiliar musical styles.
I can credit Benito for a lot of the growth that I have had as a producer. In all the work we’ve done together, we’ve challenged each other again and again, to blend genres, get out of our comfort zone, and do things that aren’t standard but feel great to us. That really helped me grow as a producer, in everything I’m doing now, and in everything I’m going to continue to do in the future.
I think that reflects in the music that we’ve made together, and how you hear all these changes and the meshing of genres in all these songs. Even if it’s a reggaetón song, you’re going to hear all these other elements. The growth has happened throughout my years as a producer but especially my work with Benito.
How has your creative relationship with him evolved since you two began working together in 2020?
I’ve been able to watch him grow and continue to develop as an artist. It has been amazing for me to assist in that. As far as our creative process and our working relationship, there’s a lot more trust. At this point, we each know how one another works and what our strengths are. We could be working on a song and he’ll say, “Mag, yo creo que le hace falta…” And I’ll complete the sentence for him. So the relationship has grown in that way. We have amazing chemistry creatively and we understand our workflow and exactly what the object is, whatever the obstacle in the song is, and we know how to get there.
I see that you produced 15 of the 23 songs in the album, and Tainy produced the other eight, but you only collaborated on one song, “La Corriente.”
Shout out to Tainy, the G.O.A.T., the legend. That [song] actually came from Tainy and his team. I was brought in last minute to structure it out, finalize and mix the song with Benito and La Paciencia. We worked on that remotely but it was still an honor to be a part of something with Tainy. He’s somebody who I’ve looked up to since I was a teenager and my entire career. Through my work with Benito, we’ve been able to actually become good friends.
I used to DJ house parties [in New York in the early 2000s], we used to call them hooky parties. We would cut high school and throw parties, and I used to play Tainy songs back then when I was 16, 17 years old. So to be in the same universe professionally with him now and to have collaborated on [“La Corriente”] is really special to me and an honor.
I peep that you dethroned him from the Hot Latin Songs Producer chart, where he held the No. 1 slot for the last three years. [Tainy landed at No. 2 this year.]
It’s wild. My competition is always myself. It’s always MAG trying to improve in what I do. I think there’s space for all of us to shine as producers in this industry, and what we’re all doing culturally for music and in Spanish-language music. Tainy, myself, Ovy [on the Drums, and other Latin producers]. It’s just a beautiful moment for Spanish-language producers.
Aside from Bad Bunny, you’ve also produced for Eladio Carrion, Imagine Dragons, Selena Gomez, Arcángel, to name a few. How working with artists of different styles affect your approach to making a song?
My approach always changes song by song. Even when I’m working with the same artist, I always try to do what’s best for that song and to deliver the product that the artist needs. Never what I think is going to be best, never what I think people are going to like, just what fits the song.
What words of advice would you give somebody who is trying to start off their career as a producer?
Take your time in constructing an identity, a sound that’s you, that gives you an identity as a producer. It’s cool to be inspired by all your favorite producers, but there’s only one of them and there’s only one of you. So take your time and mold that identity. That’s what’s going to stand out as opposed to fitting in.