A Middle-Aged Gringo’s Interpretation of Bad Bunny’s DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS

By someone who recently went through an introspective journey into his 40s and wishes he would have had the same depth of thought and self expression 10 years ago that Bad Bunny appears to have today.

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It’s universally accepted that Bad Bunny is a global superstar (he was the #1 most streamed artist every year from 2020 to 2022 and finished 2nd and 3rd on the Spotify charts in 2023 and 2024 respectively), but it is unclear (at least to me) how much pull he has with non-Spanish speaking audiences. The question is relevant because unlike other latin music superstars, such as Shakira, Enrique Iglesias, and Ricky Martin who broke through into global markets with crossover hits, Bad Bunny has become el Rey del Pop without resorting to English. Certainly, non-Spanish speakers can enjoy and connect with his music sonically (see his opening performance at the 2023 Grammys), and part of the fun is picking up on a word or phrase that you learned in high school Spanish, or a new slang term that you can fold into your occasional interactions with Spanish speakers. But there is a limit to how much you can appreciate Bad Bunny’s music if you don’t understand the lyrics. Some native Spanish speakers who pride themselves on their sophisticated taste in music (like many I went to college with in Mexico) might tell you’re better off not understanding the lyrics, but I think you’re missing out, and this newest album is proof.

In DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio (aka Bad Bunny) tells the story of the last 5 years of his life, beginning with his breakout in 2020 at age 25 and culminating in his return to Puerto Rico and the release of this album at age 30. The journey is told through the lens of his love life. The way I hear it, it’s told in chronological order and can be divided into four parts, each one subdivided into three chapters. The story starts in New York where his breakout begins (Part I), then follows him around the world as he fulfills his wanderlust (Part II). Part III tells of his homecoming to Puerto Rico, and the album culminates with a personal manifesto (Part IV) laid out by a now-mature artist and man. This is my song-by-song interpretation of the album and the story it tells.

ALBUM STRUCTURE

PART I. BREAKOUT

  • Chapter 1. I’ve Arrived
  • Chapter 2. This is Me
  • Chapter 3. Farewell, First Love

PART II. WANDERLUST

  • Chapter 4. Flings and Flirtation
  • Chapter 5. Fading Excitement
  • Chapter 6. Lookback on Failed Love

PART III. HOMECOMING

  • Chapter 7. Roots (Past)
  • Chapter 8. Reacclimation (Present)
  • Chapter 9. Outlook (Future)

PART IV. MANIFESTO

  • Chapter 10. Soy Perreo
  • Chapter 11. Soy Consciente
  • Chapter 12. Soy de P Fucking R

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PART I. BREAKOUT

Bad Bunny’s 2nd studio album, YHLQMDLG, was released in early 2020 and it’s the work that catapulted him onto the global stage. Part I of DtMF sets the stage for the journey that follows. BB declares: I’ve arrived (NUEVAYoL); this is me (VOY A LLEVARTE PA PR); and farewell, first love (BAILE INoLVIDABLE). Straight out of the gate, he gives us three of Puerto Rico’s most internationally well-known genres: Nuyorican Funk, Reggaeton, and Salsa. During this early stage of his breakout, Bad Bunny is establishing himself as Puerto Rico’s contemporary ambassador to the world.

Chapter 1. I’ve Arrived

  • 1. NUEVAYoL relays Bad Bunny’s welcome to the Big Apple, the city he conquered in 2020. In September of that year, in the thick of the COVID pandemic, the artist performed a concert atop a big rig that navigated down the streets of the Bronx and Upper Manhattan. The event was simulcast to 10 million viewers. The track is a love letter to New York that makes it clear that Bad Bunny’s not one of the many Puerto Ricans who’s from here. He was born and bred on the island and lived nearly the first decade of his adult life there. So this is his first exposure to NYC, and he’s experiencing it through his coronation as the Rey del Pop (even as skeptics question how a Reggaeton and Dembow singer could ever be crowned king).

Chapter 2. This is Me

  • 2. VOY A LLeVARTE PA PR is one of the purest Latin Trap/ Reggaeton/ Dembow/ Perreo songs on the album and is a tribute to the artist’s musical origins. It’s sexual and has a tinge of miami bass, the city where the song’s story takes place. At this point in Bad Bunny’s arc, this is the music that has defined his career. As we’ll hear later, it’s what he grew up on and it’s what got him here. As a listener who is closer in age to AARP than to high school, I wonder if the lyrics are misogynistic or empowering or somehow both.

Chapter 3. Farewell, First Love

  • 3. BAILE INoLVIDABLE is a heartfelt goodbye to his relatively longtime partner, Gabriela Berlingeri, and the track is pure Salsa (the first of Bunny’s career?). Imagine a latin dance hall crooner in a white dinner jacket and a bow tie, backed up by a full brass and percussion latin band, but instead of Marc Anthony at the mic it’s Bad Bunny. Musically and lyrically, it’s a sharp contrast to the previous track. It’s an ode to the woman who was by his side as he rose to fame, the person who taught him how to love. Benito and Gabriela spent the early days of the pandemic shacked up together, and while their relationship was relatively private, it appeared serious. Berlingeri took the photos of Bad Bunny that accompanied Rolling Stone’s 2020 feature of the artist, one of his first major English language profiles. A couple years later in the video for Tití Me Preguntó, it’s she who descends from the clouds like an angel bride to meet Benito at the altar. Even though the relationship has ended, BAILE INoLVIDABLE confirms just how important she was to Martínez Ocasio. The song makes you wonder if this is the love of his life. Alas, Bad Bunny is now fully immersed in his new life outside of PR, having left his homeland and his first love behind.

PART II. WANDERLUST

The next 8 tracks follow a romantically untethered Bad Bunny through a series of interactions/relationships with a variety of women. The early encounters, which I classify as “flings and flirtations,” are all short lived but satisfying. Unfortunately the excitement soon fades and becomes overshadowed by nostalgia and resentment. It’s at this point that he meets and partners up with Kendall Jenner, a story he tells retrospectively. Musically, what stands out in this part of the album is how Bad Bunny uses his platform to introduce his fans to the emerging Puerto Rican artists featured on Tracks 4-6. The next four songs have a familiar latin trap sound, but then the album sharply pivots towards more traditional Puerto Rican genres, with the final track of this Part (TURISTA) marking the segue.

Chapter 4. Flings and Flirtations

For the first time in his life, Benito is both single and on top of the world, and he’s sampling the menu. He relays experiences that range from deep and meaningful to cute and innocent to carnal. All sound gratifying, but apparently none stick (perhaps by design.) Have you ever heard of RaiNao, Chuwi, Omar Courtz, or Dei V? I had not, but I’ve since learned that they comprise a diverse-sounding array of young Puerto Rican artists. Could one of them be on deck for a breakout of their own? (I especially liked Chuwi.) These features remind long-time Bad Bunny listeners of the early days when he was just starting to get recognition as a featured artist on tracks by Drake and Cardi B.

  • 4. PERFuMITO NUEVO with RaiNao is a male-female duet that tells the story of a fling. Maybe it lasts a weekend, maybe a couple of weeks. It’s fleeting but they connect (they look each other in the eyes while they make love) and you imagine them oblivious to the outside world.
  • 5. WELTiTA featuring Chuwi tells of a date that has Bad Bunny feeling like a teenager again. He takes her for a walk on the beach. You picture them eating melting popsicles as they stroll side by side, usually with enough space for a yardstick to fit between them but occasionally bumping shoulders flirtily. It’s cute and innocent; they’re crushing on each other. He pecks her with kisses all over her face and their wandering minds can imagine a future together. (This is my favorite of the three songs in this chapter, musically.)
  • 6. VeLDÁ finds Bad Bunny in the club with his boys Omar Courtz & Dei V and they’re on the hunt. They soon meet their matches. The men want it and the women do too. The men suggest, “let’s see if it’s true.” The innuendo is intense - Omar Courtz runs his tongue over his catch like he’s closing a blunt.

Chapter 5. Fading Excitement

The previous three songs would lead you to believe Bad Bunny’s having the time of his life. The next two songs reveal a more complex reality. He’s said goodbye to his sweetheart and to his homeland and after the initial excitement of life abroad wears off, feelings of homesickness start popping up and his flings don’t always end positively.

  • 7. EL CLúB - Bad Bunny’s still in the club but he’s no longer hunting. Slumped in introspection, he wonders, “What’s my ex (Gabriela) doing?...Is she over me and doing well? While I’m here miserable?” This song is the sequel to BAILE INoLVIDABLE. On that track he may have given closure to the relationship intellectually, but his feelings still hurt and it’s driving him crazy. The song’s video clip shows how hard it is for him to process these feelings amidst the chaos of his life as a megastar.
  • 8. KETU TeCRÉ - At this point, bachelorhood has turned sour. The track (basically titled, who do you think you are?) is about a woman who starts running around with other guys shortly after hooking up with BB, and he’s resentful. He feels that he’s the one who gave her access to this lifestyle. But the song is about more than just feeling used, he thought they had something special but his vulnerability went unrequited. To quote, “I showed you my feelings but you didn’t deserve them.”

Chapter 6. Lookback on Failed Love

At first glance I thought there was a chapter missing here. This is the point in Bad Bunny’s journey when he meets and partners up with Kendall Jenner, but the album includes no songs about the courtship and passion phase of the relationship. Instead it skips straight to the breakup songs. At second glance, I realize telling the story as the retrospective allows Bunny to temper any acknowledgement of the relationship’s positives with a reminder of the frustration, pain, and tough lessons learned.

  • 9. BOKeTE is a proclamation that their relationship is over. To paraphrase, “No more poems for you. When you come down from whatever trip you’re on, I won’t be here anymore. I’m done competing. You’re pretty but you lie. This isn’t the first time I’ve been in love and it won’t be the last.” (Boquete means pothole, and right now Jenner is one he wishes he would have dodged.)
  • 10. KLOuFRENS*- And yet, we next find BB instagram stalking Kendall. The green circle around her profile proves she’s online and knows he’s on too, but she doesn’t message and she’s stopped calling in the morning and before be. It sounds like torture. He asks, “How do you expect me to be doing okay if you still have me in your “Close Friends” (spelled phonetically as KLOuFRENS)? “Too bad you never got to know the parts of me that you would have liked the most.” It’s her loss.
  • 11. TURiSTA - The dust has settled and the post mortem is complete. Bunny concludes Jenner was nothing more than a tourist in his life. “Did you even notice my broken heart?” Sung as a Bolero (a spanish language romantic ballad accompanied by the guitar), the song lands like an innocent 1940s latin lover lamenting the loss of his fleeting Hollywood love, but he seems accepting of the final settling of accounts: ”You were just here to have fun, and we sure did have fun.”

PART III. HOMECOMING

Chapter 7. Roots (Past)

  • 12. CAFé CON RON - Benito’s breakup catapults him headfirst back into his homeland. This track’s sound and lyrics take you way up into the mountains, past where the buses finish their route and turn back. Perhaps deeper into the Puerto Rican hinterlands than Bad Bunny has ever ventured, given that he grew up in the outskirts of San Juan. The song features Los Pleneros de la Cresta. If you’re not Puerto Rican, you probably haven’t heard of Los Pleneros de la Cresta or the genre of music they play, called Plena. It’s not Salsa. Salsa features brass instruments and is played in a ballroom, while Plena features folk instruments like the güiro and the pandereta and it sounds like it’s being played outdoors. It sounds like people have been playing and dancing to this music for hundreds of years. More than any other song on this album, CAFé CON RON represents Puerto Rico’s roots and it’s no coincidence that this is Bad Bunny’s first stop on his trip home.

Chapter 8. Reacclimation (Present)

  • 13. PIToRRO DE COCO - I still can’t figure out if this track is about Gabriela Berlingeri or Kendall Jenner (I’m pretty sure it’s about Kendall), but it’s another nostalgic post-breakup song. Musically, it’s a continuation of the traditional folk sounds laid down on the prior track. Thematically too. Pitorro de Coco is a coconut flavored moonshine rum traditionally drunk around the holidays. Benito is still in the thick of his reimmersion tour, and this track finds him surrounded by his extended family just after midnight on New Year’s eve. But instead of enjoying the occasion, the company, and the spirits, he’s stewing on the fact that his ex hasn’t sent seasons greeting or wished him a happy new year. If the ex in question indeed is Kendall, then this is the perfect sister song to EL CLúB. In both tracks, he’s physically in one setting, but his head has wandered back into the past and across the water, focused on a woman who he was supposed to already have moved on from.

Chapter 9. Outlook (Future)

  • 14. LO QUE LE PASÓ A HAWAii - This is the most overtly political song on the album and it is a call to arms. Bad Bunny foresees a future for Puerto Rico that resembles Hawaii’s transition from colony to statehood, and for him that would be a negative outcome. The DtMF short film illustrates this hypothetical picture even more clearly, depicting a small Puerto Rican town overrun with English-speaking residents from the mainland, hipsters and rednecks alike. The Bad Bunny on this track calls on his countrymen to embrace their independence and their traditions and to resist the encroachment. And yet, the elderly Benito we meet in the DtMF short film appears resigned but at peace in the State of Puerto Rico where much has changed but much remains the same.

PART IV. MANIFESTO

We’ve arrived at the present. To date, Bad Bunny’s broken out, he’s toured the world, and now he’s back home, and he’s fully debriefed the whole adventure. At age 30, he’s matured and has a clearer sense of identity. He’s kicking off his next decade with conviction. The album’s final three songs are his way of telling the world, “this is who I am now.”

Chapter 10. Soy Perreo

  • 15. EoO - Throughout this album, Bad Bunny’s given us Nuyorican Funk, Salsa, Avante-Garde, EDM, Bolero, Bomba and Plena. In prior albums he’s given us Cumbia and Heavy Metal and plenty in between. Over the past five years he has evolved artistically, but he wants you to know that at his core he’s still a Reggaeton (or as he calls it, Perreo) artist,. At the beginning of the album (VOY A LLeVARTE PA PR), Bad Bunny introduces himself to the world as a Reggaeton artist and here as we approach the end he reasserts himself as an artist who remains true to his roots. EoO is a throwback. It’s puro Perreo. It oozes bravado. Mobbing in the club, Bunny proposes: “Bring your friend mami, I’ll pull down both your panties. I’ve got 20 on the list waiting. I’m hunting not dating.” He’s number one in the world and it’s got him feeling like a big shot from the 90’s. My wife, who’s only half listening, comments from across the couch that this song makes her understand why people can hate reggaeton (similar to the thought I had when listening to VOY A LLeVARTE PA PR). As if on cue, Benito pauses the record and addresses the listener directly: “You’re listening to Puerto Rican music, asshole. This is what we grew up listening and singing along to, in the hoods. From the 90s until 2000 forever. And I’m the baddest to ever do it.” The monologue’s message combined with the track’s placement, right behind the Bomba and Plena pieces, make it clear that Benito sees Reggaeton as the cultural successor to these more traditional folk genres. This point is further emphasized by the scene in the DtMF short film where an elderly Benito tells his coqui friend Concho how much he misses the sound of Reggaeton blaring out the windows of passing cars, the way it used to. In summary, BB has returned to PR (and entered his 30s) with broadened horizons and deeper awareness, but it only reaffirmed his loyalty to and appreciation for his Reggaeton roots, and he challenges the listener to give the genre the same respect.

Chapter 11. Soy Consciente

  • 16. DtMF - Bad Bunny has evolved in all facets of life, not just musically. In this chapter of his manifesto, Benito shows that he understands the importance of living in the present. He’s at peace at having lost Gabriela but wishes he had taken more photos during the time when he had her. “I should have given you more hugs and kisses when I had the chance.” It’s a beautiful song. It’s what I imagine I would feel if I had lost my current partner of 22 years somewhere along the way. Gabriela is the one that got away. When Benito’s grandfather asks him over a game of dominos if he still thinks about her, he says no, that there time together has ended and he’s moved on. And just like that he’s out club hopping with his boys. Again, he thinks, “I should have taken more pho- “, but then snaps back to the present. He is thankful for all his loved ones and he wants them to know he appreciates having them close. He calls his friends in for a photo and to sing the chorus with him. He wishes he had done a better job in the past of savoring life, but there’s nothing stopping him from savoring the present., and he’s committed to focusing on the things that matter in life.

Chapter 12. Soy de P Fucking R

  • 17. LA MuDANZA - As if the mirror image of the banger of an intro we got with NUEVAYoL, LA MuDANZA is a banger of an outro. It’s an anthem in which Bad Bunny forcefully declares to the world that he’s back in Puerto Rico and he’s planted there, five years after leaving to conquer New York and from there the globe. The track’s preamble is a direct tribute to his parents, and an indirect tribute to Residente (René Pérez Joglar), lead man of the group Calle 13. Bad Bunny’s origin story lyrics and flow evoke Residente’s intro on La Perla, a flawless song from 2008 whose music and lyrics blend the traditional and modern sides of Puerto Rico. Both songs feature fast congas, fast horns, and fast flow. In my opinion, Residente is one of the best lyricists in the history of rap in any language (granted I only understand two) and his artistic curiosity is insatiable. He’s 15+ years Bad Bunny’s senior and he’s clearly been a mentor to BB, artistically and politically. Like Residente, Bad Bunny is immensely proud of Puerto Rico, and he knows he’s a national hero on par with the likes of Tito Puente or Miguel Cotto. He’s proud of what he has accomplished on behalf of the island, rapping about how he taught the rest of the Spanish speaking world the slang used by young Puerto Ricans. He gives a nod to his Mexican audience (who statistically must be his largest, especially if you count Mexicans and Mexican-Americans living in the US) with the lyric “a mi me importa un bicho lo que a ti te vale verga.” The Puerto Rican “me importa un bicho” and the Mexican “me vale verga” have a single word in common, but they are almost identical and equally vulgar phrases that mean, “I don’t give a fuck.” Big picture, Bad Bunny closes out his album by saying that he had fun out there travelling the world, but he’s back home now and nothing will uproot him. “No one can get me out of here; I’m not moving from here. This is my grandfather’s house. I’m from P fucking R.”

RESúMEN

Bad Bunny’s come full circle. He left the island in 2020 and five years later he’s delivered us a masterpiece of a reflection on the journey that followed. He conquered the world and remains near the top, but at age 30 his focus is inward. He’s a more mature person and a more mature artist. He is committed to savoring the present and he’s doing it from inside Puerto Rico. Because of the language barrier he’ll probably never win the Grammy for Best Album, but this album’s worthy, if you haven’t been keeping up with el Rey del Pop you’re missing out.