It’s 11:30 p.m. on October 12, and the José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is packed. More than 16,000 Bad Bunny superfans have gathered to become the first people on the planet to hear their hometown hero’s new album. Nobody knows what to expect.
Bad Bunny, whose real name is Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio, is a boundary-defying artist whose last 4 studio albums span hip-hop, reggaeton, Latin pop, Puerto Rican trap, and Mexican country music. Tonight’s crowd embodies this broad spectrum: Many other people are dressed in white T-shirts and flat-brimmed blue caps from their recent song “A Preview. “Others play with cowboy hats from “Where She Goes. “Many simply wear bunny ears.
“I listened to a lot of salsa from my dad, a lot of ballads and merengue from my mom. But being a kid of the ’90s, so is reggaeton and rap,” Bad Bunny says in an interview at his Spanish-language venue. “There are many artists from other genres, countries and eras that are in me. “
If there’s one constant for the 29-year-old Bad Bunny, it’s that everything he creates becomes a global hit. For the past 3 years, the 2019 Forbes 30 Under 30 alumnus has been the most streamed artist on Spotify, with 35. 9 billion. transmissions. Her YouTube channel has attracted more than 32 billion views, more than Justin Bieber, Ed Sheeran and, yes, Taylor Swift. He has won 3 Grammys and 11 Latin Grammys. In April, he made history as the first Latin artist to headline the Coachella music festival.
And he did it all by making a song only in Spanish. “Spanish is part of me, it’s in my DNA,” he says. “I like to talk about it, I go, not to impose it on people, but because that’s the way it is. “I am. “
Warren wealth: Martinez Ocasio says she invests most of her income source in real estate. He owns several homes in the continental United States and Puerto Rico.
This made him incredibly wealthy. Last year, Bad Bunny earned about $88 million (before taxes) from global tours, billions from streams, and deals with the most sensible brands like Adidas and Corona. That functionality is enough to debut at No. 10 on Forbes’ list of highest-paid artists. .
“It’s not about money,” he says of how he chooses his partners. “It’s about how much I love the logo and how much they’re going to respect my creativity. “
Back in the arena, the audience explodes as Bad Bunny descends from the ceiling, perched atop a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow.
Tonight, the musician wears a fitted burgundy suit with a half-open white blouse. His face is covered by a mask reminiscent of Spider-Man’s, but black with glowing red eyes. “I’m very embarrassed to bet on new songs that haven’t come out yet,” he says. He starts reading on his iPhone and the listening party for his album Nobody Knows What Is Going to Happen Tomorrow explodes.
Although none of the lyrics are known, the crowd screams and dances to the new songs. Bad Bunny does not sing the two songs on the album she released the previous year. His face remains shrouded until midnight, after which he removes his mask to reveal his new haircut, which, like the new album, will pay homage to the early trap-style music that propelled him to fame. international.
Arturo Elizondo, Jomayra Herrera, Cami Tellez, Jaime Castro, Bad Bunny, and Randall Lane attend the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 Summit at the Cleveland Public Auditorium.
Bad Bunny is the archetype of a popular pop idol: a truly global artist who leverages the enormous success of streaming facilities and social media to bring what was once regional music to billions of listeners. “It takes the pulse of culture like no one else,” says Jeremy Erlich, Spotify’s chief music officer. “It dictates what culture becomes. “
Streaming is making the world smaller. Over the last five years, Spotify has seen a 170% surge in streams of Latin music, a genre that—along with other styles including West African Afrobeats and K-pop—has hooked hundreds of millions of new listeners thanks to viral memes on Instagram and TikTok and streaming services like Spotify, Pandora and Apple Music. Says Spotify’s Erlich: “The historic Anglo dominance of music is getting broken down at a crazy pace.”
Bad Bunny didn’t stop at music. Earlier this year, he made the impression in the Amazon Prime movie Cassandro. In October, he doubled as host and musical guest on Saturday Night Live. A virtual edition of Bad Bunny gets to hit the bodies of his opponents in the hit wrestling video game WWE. 2k23. All this in a year that he had declared a time of rest.
His broad appeal allows him to effortlessly move from WWE cage matches to Italian tailoring. This fall, she appeared in Gucci commercials, selling her high-end Savoy luggage in the style of Kendall Jenner. In the past, it partnered with Crocs, the cult rubber clog company, and introduced a line of glow-in-the-dark shoes in 2020. They were temporarily sold out. His newest shoe with Adidas, the $160 “Paso Fino” sneakers, also sold out.
This is Bad Bunny’s fourteenth sneaker with the German sportswear company. Other shoe brands approached him, but only Adidas presented artistic control. ” He inspires a lot of people, not only locally, but also around the world,” says Torben Schumacher, Global Managing Director of Adidas Originals.
Before he was a worldwide superstar, Bad Bunny was simply Benito, an audiovisual communications student at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo. When he wasn’t in class, he bagged groceries at Econo stores and created Latin trap songs he’d upload to SoundCloud.
That all changed in 2016, when his trap single “Soy Peor” (“I Am Worse”) made Bad Bunny a household name. Fame came with the release of “Diles Remix” the same year. For 2018, he took part with some of the biggest names in music, including Drake, Cardi B, and J Balvin. Just weeks before the Covid-19 shutdowns, he joined Shakira and Jennifer Lopez for the 2020 Super Bowl halftime show in Miami. During quarantine, she went live on Instagram, where she has 46. 8 million followers, and released her collaboration-filled album The Unreleased.
“I can make a living with music,” he says. But possibly she wouldn’t settle for that. He will have more unexpected associations with logos, acting gigs and, later, his own fashion logo. All without ever forgetting Puerto Rico.
His native island is central to his image—and his business. In 2021, he became co-owner of the Santurce Cangrejeros, a local pro basketball team. To support homegrown talent, he has started a sports management agency called Rimas Sports.
He also built a charity branch. In 2018, she established the Good Bunny Foundation, a San Juan-based nonprofit that supports arts and sports opportunities for young people in Puerto Rico. It has distributed about $2 million in the past two years. “In the absence of government, it’s the artists who end up fulfilling those roles,” he says.
It remains to be seen whether Bad Bunny will have the longevity of Madonna or Prince for several decades. But don’t expect him to spend too much time relaxing poolside at one of her mansions. He feels his legal responsibility to those millions. of fans, both online and offline. “Fame,” she says, “pushes me to keep working. ”