Released on January 5th of this year, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS (written with this combination of lowercase and uppercase letters) has been, to date, the most successful album in terms of online streams released in 2025. Only the eternal Taylor Swift, who has not released any work this year, and the anticipated return of The Weeknd have been able to keep pace with a Bad Bunny in absolute prime form. Within hours of its release, his new catalog of songs had already united all critics: it is possibly Martínez Ocasio's best album. Or at least the richest in genres and influences. The richness of an album can be a subjective opinion, but the journey its protagonist has taken is not. Bad Bunny became a star by focusing on his origins, on Puerto Rico, and instead of distancing himself, he has focused more than ever on this album. "When you're far away, that's when you appreciate things the most," Bad Bunny said in his last interview with The New York Times, which highlighted in the headline that he had made his album "more Puerto Rican." And it's like that from the cover, presided over by two empty chairs as a symbol of the gentrification of Puerto Rico, one of the central themes of the album. There is a song – Lo Que Pasó a Hawái – that openly addresses it, and he constantly voices his opinion: "They want to take our beaches... They're selling the houses... And nobody realizes what's happening here," he explained to Forbes, where he emphasized that it's not just an economic problem, but also "cultural and identity-related." The references to his country are constant, to the past – including texts about the history of Puerto Rico – and to the present, not only in his denunciations but also in the inclusion of new artists from the country, quite unknown until now in Catalonia, and who collaborate on DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS. This is the case of RaiNao, the Aldorondo brothers, Chuwi, and Omar Courtz. The most paradigmatic thing is that Bad Bunny has achieved his most resounding success with the album that most focuses on locality. The reason must also be found in the type of song. At a time of certain stagnation in urban music, Martínez Ocasio has managed to broaden his musical horizons and lean towards salsa – the album opens with NUEVAYoL and a sample of the classic Un verano en Nueva York, by El Gran Combo, and there are references to Fania artists, such as Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe – and other Latin music, in addition to the modern base: dembow, reggaeton, disco, and house. Indirectly, there is also a Catalan presence, as Rosalía is cited in a song – Voy a llevarte pa’ PR – and in Weltita he sings a verse from La flaca, by Jarabe de Palo. Only a few months after its release, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS is already one of those albums that have come to stay and appear on the classic lists of historical albums you have to listen to before you die.
Bad Bunny: who and what is hidden behind this musical phenomenon?
We analyze the life and work of the Puerto Rican artist who in less than 24 hours sold 600,000 tickets for his concerts in Barcelona on May 22 and 23
BarcelonaJulio Iglesias, Luis Miguel, Shakira, Juan Gabriel, Ricky Martin. There is a long list of Latin singers who in the last half-century have amassed colossal figures, especially in the United States. That said, although the numbers have accompanied them unequivocally, they have not always enjoyed the prestige of their Anglo-Saxon counterparts. It has taken a new generation and the era of urban music to break down the barriers and cultural prejudices that had historically held them back. Of the entire new wave, the first to unite a massive, universal, and transversal audience with specialized criticism is Bad Bunny.
The Puerto Rican is not only an artist adored by connoisseurs, but he has also achieved a milestone until recently unthinkable, regardless of genre: selling 600,000 tickets in a record time for his twelve concerts scheduled for Barcelona and Madrid. If we were to do extreme calculations: in the event that all attendees at these shows were of Spanish nationality, 1.28% of the state population would see Bad Bunny live during the spring of 2026. Such is the magnitude of his fame and cultural impact. But who and what is hiding behind this phenomenon?
Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, born in Vega Baja, Puerto Rico, in 1994, is the real name of this contemporary genius. Son of a truck driver and a public school teacher, before becoming one of the great icons of the 21st century, Bad Bunny, who calls himself this due to a rabbit costume his parents bought him as a child, did not grow up in a wealthy family, nor one with artistic pretensions. His life proceeded with a certain normality until 2016, when, as a student of audiovisual communication and an occasional supermarket packer, he received the opportunity he had been waiting for.
A viral success
His beginnings are similar to those of other artists with great musical careers in recent years, such as Billie Eilish and Lil Nas X. They are artists who managed to viralize a song out of nowhere, without mentors or any promotional platform behind them. Until then, Benito was just a music enthusiast who independently published tracks on SoundCloud, as thousands of young people do every day around the world. But unlike what happens to most, he hit the nail on the head. At the beginning of that year, he released the song that would change his life forever, Diles. This single, close to the trap sounds that were then experiencing their great moment of explosion, moved quickly through the internet and caught the attention of producer DJ Luian, who history will remember as his great discoverer.
Once positioned, and taking advantage of the context of the rise of Latin music paired with urban genres –reggaeton, trap, pop–, his career has been meteoric. When someone rises so high and so quickly, they must have an extraordinary talent, a fact more than demonstrated by Bad Bunny, who has applied the originality and ingenuity he shows in his songs to his business decisions, which are never rushed or erratic. After the success of that debut, he managed to enter the charts with a new single, Soy peor, on which J Balvin, Ozuna, and Arcángel ended up collaborating. A year later, in 2018, it was the turn of the first global number 1 with I like It, sung with Cardy B and J Balvin. It was the beginning of a long list. That same year he released X 100pre, the first album, which already features Drake, a global star and a huge reference in North America.
Consolidated as a world-class reference artist, Bad Bunny was part of the lineup for the Sónar festival in Barcelona, but the best was yet to come: between 2020 and 2025, he released four albums –YHLQMDLG, Un verano sin ti, Nadie sabe lo que va a pasar mañana, and DeBÍ TiRAR MÁS FOTos– which reached number 1 in the United States and Spain. This industry dominance and his influence on everything he touches have made him the most important non-Anglo-Saxon male artist in the world today. Bad Bunny turns everything he touches into gold and makes every release an event. He is also one of the best-connected men in the world, as his circle of friends includes everyone from the Kardashians (he dated Kendall Jenner) to Javier Bardem, Penélope Cruz, LeBron James, and Kylian Mbappé.
Focusing on the musical aspect, Bad Bunny is a prodigy of modern song, a creator on par with any other legendary composer, and the author of some of the best choruses of recent years. The Puerto Rican artist has managed to broaden the spectrum of urban music and adapt it to the most skeptical, all while building a truly unique universe based on pop songs sung with a very characteristic voice and lyrics that speak exactly to how and what young people want today. Furthermore, he has unhesitatingly confronted the classism that has historically accompanied reggaeton and Latin music, viewed by a segment of white society as a lesser genre. Martínez Ocasio has managed to overcome prejudices and genres. “I am not an urban artist, I am a universal artist,” he has said. This explains his latest album, an undisguised nod to the legendary New York salsa label Fania Records and to musicians like trombonist Willie Colón and singer Héctor Lavoe. Benito has gone through all the stages of urban music to arrive at making the most transversal Latin pop of today.
The artist of the 21st century
In 2020, when Bad Bunny was already one of the most relevant musicians of the moment, after releasing YHLQMDLG, the cultural supplement of the New York Times dedicated an interview to him that, according to the author, Carina del Valle Schorske, had lasted more than six hours. And he always has a lot to say. The journalist alerted the reader from the first line: “Bad Bunny has come to dominate global pop on his own terms”. But what are his terms? Music aside, in which the wind has favored him, one of his strong points has been the fact of having a canonical public image that matches what the audience asks for.
Although he has not been free from accusations of misogyny for some of his lyrics, Martínez Ocasio has been a benchmark for what are known as new masculinities. Not only has he openly denounced machismo within the genre and the industry, but he has also known how to self-reflect –"I get jealous for no reason and that is machismo", he sings in Un verano sin ti"– and break with an overly dominant aesthetic within the urban genre. Benito wears skirts, paints his nails, and unreservedly denounces transphobia and toxic gender relations. These types of stances connect him directly with Generation Z and have made him a reference beyond music. In fact, currently, and after so many disappointments, it seems necessary to know that our idols are more or less clean to feel at ease. Among artists with a reputation for being misogynistic or racist like J Balvin, Maluma, and Nicky Jam, Bad Bunny has been articulating an open, committed, coherent, and contemporary discourse.
Furthermore, taking a political stance is absolutely necessary to be a global artist today. On the local front, he was one of the artists who raised the flag against the governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rosselló. It wasn't enough for him to have participated in the citizen mobilizations demanding his resignation, so when he finally stepped down, he made a song to celebrate it with Residente (Calle 13). He also didn't become too friendly with the next leader, quite the opposite: he was a constant nightmare for Pedro Pierluisi, who was publicly vilified by Benito, who didn't hesitate to sing “I don't want to leave here, let them leave” in the song El apagón. In addition to his aversion to the New Progressive Party of Puerto Rico and the colonial status of his land, he has openly shown himself to be contrary to Catholic conservatism and criticized Donald Trump on Jimmy Fallon's show on NBC.
A global phenomenon
In 2025, the concept of a generalist artist has given way to that of great niches. Although we obviously have very well-known pop stars –The Weeknd, Miley Cyrus, Bruno Mars, Lady Gaga–, it is difficult to find figures who are unanimously known in every corner of the planet. What new artists are popular in the cross-cutting and international way that Michael Jackson and Madonna were in the nineties? Apart from some totems from other generations –Bruce Springsteen, Coldplay, Beyoncé–, surely only Taylor Swift has this range today. Bad Bunny's merit is being an artist who is getting close. And it is even more special given that he is an artist who does not sing in English.
Bad Bunny has already surpassed 100 million monthly listeners on Spotify several times, and is often one of the three most listened-to artists worldwide. On the reigning streaming platform, Benito was the first Spanish-speaking artist to be number 1 for three consecutive years. When compared to other undisputed names, the World's Hottest Tour, from two years ago, was the highest-grossing tour globally that year: it surpassed artists like Ed Sheeran and Coldplay and became the most lucrative ever by a Latin artist in the United States, with over 88 million dollars grossed.
In this new way of understanding musical consumption and repositioning the status of the popular musician, absolutely fragmented, Bad Bunny has managed to sweep almost everything and become an artist who is breaking records and becoming the definitive Latin artist.
However, even today, despite everything and with so much data in his favor, it is not difficult to come across comments of disparagement towards him and his work because he makes urban music and makes it in Puerto Rican Spanish. Martínez Ocasio proudly sings Nuevayol – instead of New York– and veldá – instead of truth–. If you have reached the end of this text and are one of those people who have not yet entered the world of Bad Bunny, the advice I would give you would be, above all, to listen to him. And to listen to him with your ears wide open. The times they are a-changin, as they used to say.