Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Set Signals a Cultural Shift (Full Transcript)

[00:00:01] Speaker 1: His latest album, it's all about, like, also reaching out to the diaspora. You know, the reason why he sings De mi tirar más fotos is because he's like, I should have taken more photos when you were around, you know, when we were in the same neighborhood. And that's something that transcends Puerto Rican culture. I think especially it speaks to so many Latinos, so many immigrants who were like either, you know, they were seeking a better life or they had to flee, they're refugees. And that's what made this album so powerful. Or if you've ever had to leave your home to make a better life or fulfill your dreams, this is this is an album for you. Hey, my name is Susie Exposito, and I am a music journalist and editor at Delos, the Latin culture wing of the L.A. Times.

[00:00:52] Speaker 2: Now, you are not just any journalist, any music journalist. You are the music journalist who has profiled Bad Bunny multiple times and each time. So you've spent time with him. Yes. Yes.

[00:01:07] Speaker 1: I mean, a lot of it was over Zoom in 2020. My most famous profile of him was in 2020 for Rolling Stone for the cover of Rolling Stone, for which I became the first Latina to write a Rolling Stone cover story. And that came out in May of 2020. And we spent hours together on Zoom because I was I was on my way to the island and then everything shut down because of COVID. So yeah.

[00:01:33] Speaker 2: And on the cover, he has a mask. He's like pulling down, you know, what we now see is that COVID era mask. I don't know what it's like for you, but I remember when I was coming up, if I tried to pitch an up and coming musician. It was always this super involved pitch. I was like, no. So what's interesting is. So then you know, I promise you, they're really interesting.

[00:01:54] Speaker 1: Like, is that what you've had to do? Oh, absolutely. For like almost two years, it took a lot of campaigning because I, you know, I kept showing up to meetings and I was like, I was like, J Balvin, Bad Bunny, they're blowing up. They're going to be a huge deal. And like, you may not understand them literally, but people are like on to them. Like it's it's something that we would hate to miss, like as as Rolling Stone. Like I was like, these are not artists that you should be missing out on right now. It would be best if we were early to make the call. I mean, I started campaigning in 2018, especially after Bad Bunny and J Balvin, they landed their first number one hit with Cardi B in 2018, which was called I Like It. And I mean, I was I was into them already, just, you know, by the grace of growing up Latina and growing up.

[00:02:55] Speaker 2: Well, but this is why I'm asking about this. It's like like I'm from Jamaica. So like reggae, reggaeton, like I'm sort of like vaguely aware of this music, but I'm also aware that people see them as some ethnic music over there. That comes out of passing car windows, that is not related to mainstream music. And over the last couple of years, that has changed so radically that we can now land in this moment for Bad Bunny, like that this thing that just happened with the Super Bowl in a way was a culmination of something not just for him, right, but in the world of music.

[00:03:31] Speaker 1: I feel like the sea change has already come in the music industry. And this just further confirms that.

[00:03:39] Speaker 2: But it comes in waves, right? Like, yeah, when I think about a moment in the Halftime Show, you know, my little middle school heart sort of jumped out of my chest when it was like Ricky Martin appeared, right? And it's because when Ricky Martin burst on the scene with the Grammys, keep that in mind, the Grit, right? He literally was already making music and doing great. Yes. But he literally burst out with this phenomenal legend Grammy performance. And this is at the time where people were like, the Latin explosion and like all the music journalists, right? You remember this? I do. Yeah. Even though it was all artists who, in a way, were being embraced for singing in English. Yes. Were being embraced specifically for their crossover appeal. That's kind of one of the times I remember thinking people were like talking about how global the music scene was.

[00:04:31] Speaker 1: That's when they were siloing everything into like world music. Yes. It was a different time. Yeah. If you were making music that wasn't in English, you'd be thrown in a bucket called world music. And if you wanted to make it in the mainstream, you had to sing in English or bust. That's just how it was.

[00:04:49] Speaker 2: So fast. Yeah. And that's why it was so wild having Ricky Martin sing in the show. Not just because, you know, Bad Bunny sort of saying, look, here's an artist I looked up to and I want to give him his flowers. Right. As the young people say. Yeah. But he had him singing a song that, as far as I was reading, is kind of an anti-colonial anthem on the Bad Bunny album. So tell me about this song and tell me about that. Because I do think this kind of song is the difference between a Ricky Martin and a Bad Bunny. Exactly.

[00:05:22] Speaker 1: I mean, Ricky Martin singing Lo Que Le Paso a Hawaii, you know, what happened to Hawaii and singing it in Spanish, which is a language that, you know, most people in the United States is not familiar with hearing him sing in, was a really beautiful moment for Ricky Martin as well. You know, like beautiful moment for Bad Bunny. He always, you know, he's really good about shouting out the people who came before him. And he and Ricky, they have been working together since Bad Bunny released his 2018 album. But for someone like Ricky Martin, who came up, you know, in a boy band in the 80s and really just like worked tooth and nail to remain in the music industry. And eventually he did make that crossover in the 90s by singing in English. Like, I mean, the Cup of Life was sensational. Livin La Vida Loca, like, how can we forget, you know? But turning up weddings everywhere, every year since. Yeah. But he needed to, he went back to his roots. And so like Ricky Martin is somebody for whom, you know, he felt like he did have to sell himself out, you know, for some time. And just thinking about the trajectory of his career, like he didn't come out as gay until 2010. He literally like had to put aside his queerness. He put aside his Puerto Rican-ness. And last night, I mean, we've seen the way that he's embraced his queerness. That's not new. But the way that he really embraced not just his Puerto Rican-ness, but his like patriotism for Puerto Rico specifically, an island which, you know, has been, it's a colony. It's effectively a U.S. colony. And so for Ricky Martin to take a political stance like that, after being, you know, the darling of the U.S. mainstream, it is, it was really powerful to see him especially speak up for like Puerto Rican sovereignty.

[00:07:40] Speaker 3: That's what that song is about.

[00:07:48] Speaker 2: Yeah, we should say the lyrics of that song, some of them are like, they want to take away the river, they want to take away the beach. They want my neighborhood, right? They want my grandma to leave. And the line that comes, I don't want them to do to you what happened in Hawaii. Yeah. Right. Another kind of colonized, now a state, but like had such ramifications for the Native community there.

[00:08:14] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. To the point where like so much of the islands in Hawaii are like privatized. They're just like owned by millionaires, billionaires. And there's like entire places that have ancestral significance for people from Hawaii, for Native Hawaiians. And they can't access it anymore. And I think that Puerto Ricans have every right to feel very concerned about the same thing happening in Puerto Rico, especially after the hurricane. People came in to buy land. You know, they snatched it up. They wanted the tax benefits of living in Puerto Rico.

[00:08:54] Speaker 2: And I think that even the Ricky Martin moment, I have to be honest, it didn't seem political if you didn't know the song. Right. It was like, oh, T.O. Martin is singing. This is so great. And like all the moms at home screaming. And I want to talk about the sort of the weight of expectations that was like this will be political and what that was supposed to look like. Oh, it was political.

[00:09:19] Speaker 1: It was just in Spanish.

[00:09:22] Speaker 2: You know, like you'd have. But it's also very fun. You know what I mean? It was like we're at a wedding. We're at the bodega. We're here. Like to me, you know what I mean? Like the sugarcane fields have feet. Like it was the ultimate split screen.

[00:09:37] Speaker 1: It was an overlaid screen, which I've never seen. It's like a throwback to the history of Puerto Rico, but also the history of the Caribbean of Latin America. And how we arrived at this musical moment has roots in the sugarcane fields. Thinking about how sounds, you know, like folkloric kinds of sounds like Bomba y Plena, which which Bad Bunny plays with on his last album. Those were derived from people brought over from Africa to be enslaved. You know, they were derived from the Taino people, the indigenous people in the Caribbean. It was a beautiful way to remind people, oh, no, we've been here for like hundreds, thousands of years. And like it this and we're using the same rhythms. We're dancing to the same rhythms that people were dancing to 500 years ago. And that's as a story that's America.

[00:10:32] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. That that's America, which a lot of people are pointing to the end with all of the flags of the countries of the Americas, which people may not remember. Yeah. America's. The Dunro doctrine of it all.

[00:10:47] Speaker 1: Exactly. Exactly. And that's that was like a course correction in the narrative of America is just reminding people that America is really a lot more, you know, than the United States. It's a it's a bunch of different countries and also like territories, colonies. And we're all part of this broad fabric that is America. But people want to make it singular. People want to also like ignore the humanity of so many people who are on the same land. And I feel like the scenes with, you know, the nail salon, the bodega.

[00:11:29] Speaker 2: That's where I felt represented.

[00:11:31] Speaker 1: Yeah. The taco stand. Like, yeah, these were these are beautiful little vignettes that touched upon, like, you know, our humanity is Latino. It's like we keep the neighborhoods running. We keep society running in so many different ways.

[00:11:48] Speaker 2: And also to see the working class being represented because Super Bowl halftime shows are by definition about spectacle. Yes. They're about wild imagery, symbolism, especially the last couple of shows. Right. If you think about like Rihanna's big floating runway or even Kendrick Lamar's sort of game of life. I've never seen a Super Bowl show that was set in real life, air quotes, like the amount of moment and scenes where I was like, oh, this is just the guys playing checkers or dominoes, like the kids living room. Everything about it was so weirdly rooted. It was like hyper realism instead of spectacle. Right. He wasn't jumping down from the stadium. There's no dancing shark. It was very literal. Yes. In a good way. You know what I mean? And he was talking to the screen and that like to Dolly Spike Lee shot. Like, yes, I was just like, this is the most I have felt inside of a show before.

[00:12:49] Speaker 1: Yeah. He brought Puerto Rico to the stadium and he brought the house from his residency, from like his tour to the stadium, which I loved, the Casita. And it was like, you know, with his Puerto Rico residency, he wanted people to come and see the Puerto Rico that he sings about because it's just like inextricable from his identity as an artist, as Puerto Rico. But I just I loved the ways that he that he brought it to the stadium. It was like a movie set. It was like a living organism that we're watching on the screen.

[00:13:26] Speaker 2: It was. That's a great way to put it. He takes his his context wherever he goes. Exactly. When I try and come up with a parallel, I was thinking about Beyonce and the roots of her Cowboy Carter album coming from her being sort of snubbed at the Country Music Awards. And then I was thinking about how, you know, it was a while back where Tony Hinchcliffe, the comedian at the Trump campaign rally, called Puerto Rico garbage. Yeah. And now here we are. Here we are. I know you're going to tell me because he's been working on this album for a while, but there is something about this that feels it's not just a rebuke. It's undeniable.

[00:14:09] Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that the core of Debby Tiradmas Fotos is the like love that he has for Puerto Rico. And it's a slogan that he that he used at the Grammys that he brought up again at the Super Bowl. But, you know, like the only thing that's more powerful than hate is love. And so he doesn't come at it. I mean, a little bit. I think I think Bad Bunny is allowed to be a little petty.

[00:14:37] Speaker 2: I mean, he could have been at Vegas doing that residency. Right. He didn't do any of that. He went there. There's lots of people who could talk a good game defending Puerto Rico. And I feel like that guy went and tried to build a financial shield around it. You know what I mean? Like he took an action that was so it was putting your money where your mouth is massively.

[00:15:03] Speaker 1: Yeah. He can't half ass anything, that's for sure. And I think that the theme of the album really is just how much he wants his people, his culture to thrive. It's not just about him. It's about, you know, like uplifting the Puerto Rican people, also whether they live in Puerto Rico or whether they've had to leave, because it's it's astonishing the number of people who left Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. You know, they're estimating one hundred eighty thousand to two hundred thousand people left the island, which is a massive exodus. And but he's, you know, his latest album, it's all about, like, also reaching out to the diaspora. You know, the reason why he sings de mi tirar mas fotos is because he's like, I should have taken more photos when you were around, you know, when we were in the same neighborhood, when we were all living in grandma's house together. I really wish that I relished that time with you. And that's something that transcends Puerto Rican culture. I think especially it speaks to so many Latinos, so many immigrants who had to leave their homes, who were, you know, who were like either, you know, they were seeking a better life or they had to flee. They're refugees. And I think that's what made this album so powerful. Or if you've ever had to leave your home to make a better life or fulfill your dreams, this is this is an album for you.

[00:16:34] Speaker 2: While you have one part of the political culture trying to define what it is to be an American in like very specific ways, which we saw with like the TPUSA answer, right, about faith and freedom and the people who couldn't stand that Bad Bunny did not sing in English. But at the same time, you have people embracing Latino pop culture figures. And when you look at that as someone who's had to lobby, right, to even talk about these things to get stories done, what do you see?

[00:17:10] Speaker 1: I see. I see a cultural dissonance that's really alarming, to be honest, I live in Los Angeles where I've been seeing people being being arrested outside of, you know, like you see street vendors getting arrested, you see videos of ICE agents like running into shops that people frequent, you know, and taking out our neighbors. And so it is really wild to see Spanish language music on such a prominent platform, but also people being excited about it. And there is a political significance to the number of people who don't speak Spanish and didn't grow up in the culture being really enthusiastic about it, because it is to be so loud and proud in a time when a lot of people really like in their everyday lives are hiding. You know, they're not going to work. They're not going to school. They're afraid of being profiled. There are people being profiled for speaking Spanish or just being brown.

[00:18:23] Speaker 2: Right. Under the allowances from the Supreme Court ruling and commentary from Brett Kavanaugh.

[00:18:28] Speaker 1: That's the thing is it's been enshrined in the law. Like these things are being written into laws. And I know that like I know that Black people in the U.S. have been sounding the alarm for ages and ages. And I think that this is a time when to see the like I feel like the enthusiasm, the joy of it all, it is showing like a growing resistance to what, you know, these these insane overreaches of power that we're seeing from the federal government and, you know, the racism and discrimination and xenophobia that is being written into law and every day, you know.

[00:19:08] Speaker 2: I have to admit, I actually really wrestle with this because I think, you know, there's that old saying of like everybody wants to be Black, but nobody wants to be Black. Like the idea that, you know, American culture is very good at embracing Black and brown people singing, dancing, running with a ball like the same community is hurting. Yeah. And there's just this kind of silence about one versus the other.

[00:19:36] Speaker 1: I think that the right is really struggling with the fact that that they're losing the culture war, like the things that the federal government is doing right now. Like they're wildly unpopular. They're only like losing popularity. They don't have a cultural leg to stand on. We see how, you know, like Kid Rock's alternative halftime show was a flop.

[00:20:10] Speaker 2: I think at one point it had a few million viewers on socials, but yes, comparatively. In comparison. In comparison. And actually there's no comparison, but even the fight over the Kennedy Center or the fight over like one of the things that I remember is like there's so much conversation on the right that's like we need to take back the conversation around culture, reorient it around all the things we care about. English speaking, faith, like Western culture. You hear that a lot. Western civilization. Yeah. And it's like who in the West? Who? Who are we?

[00:20:48] Speaker 1: Yeah. And I think like they really struggle with the fact that like Bad Bunny was not asked to perform at the Super Bowl for diversity points. You know, the NFL was not looking for diversity points when they asked Bad Bunny to play the Super Bowl. They asked him because he's literally never are. Yeah. He's just the best man for the job. He is like the number one most streamed artist in the world. Why wouldn't they ask him? And I think that, you know, like, I mean, if you want to talk numbers like his residency brought in hundreds of millions of dollars to Puerto Rico. We know how tough of a competitor Taylor Swift is. She released an album last year and Bad Bunny still eclipsed her in streaming numbers.

[00:21:36] Speaker 2: Yeah. We haven't had so many big pop culture displays of solidarity for the Latin American community. We're usually fighting like, yeah, yeah. Yes. I mean, it's a huge community, right? It's a diaspora community with like very big domestic politic partisan splits. But is there something about this moment that could be like a catalyst for more conversation or a catalyst for people to feel more comfortable speaking up?

[00:22:12] Speaker 1: I think it's massive that a Puerto Rican artist like Bad Bunny has expressed so much solidarity with immigrants. Puerto Rico is under its own conditions, like the way that Puerto Ricans experience the United States. It's a different relationship. It's a colonial relationship and it's something, you know, they have their own proper struggle. I've heard people before. I mean, I don't want to bring in like a straw man, but I've heard people say, like, you know, you worry about your stuff like we don't, you know, we have to worry about our stuff and it goes both ways. Like I've I've heard other Latinos be like, oh, you know, Puerto Ricans complain so much, but they're the ones who, you know, you're part of the U.S. and it's like they can't even vote. Like, what kind of citizenship is that? It's not citizenship. It's second class citizenship. And so like the solidarity between Puerto Ricans happening right now and like the rest of, you know, the Latin American Latino population in the U.S. is incredible to see. I mean, I can't say that we're always fighting. We love each other's cultures. I mean, yes, we're fighting and then we're falling in love with each other.

[00:23:32] Speaker 2: There were all those flags at the end. And I was like, oh, you know, when he showed all the flags of Latin America and the Caribbean, it was a kind of Pan-Americanism that in a way seemed to say the opposite of what you're saying. Right. That like maybe we are not a divided community the way we've been dealt with.

[00:23:53] Speaker 1: Yeah, we shouldn't we shouldn't be divided. I thought it was such a like, I mean, a really powerful statement. You know, it wasn't that complicated to read, but we should have each other's backs. Like it's we can't talk about colonialism like it's something that happened in the past. It's still actively happening, you know, not just in Puerto Rico. But you see, I mean, there are actually in a political moment where that's explicitly what people want.

[00:24:23] Speaker 2: Right. Like to put those things.

[00:24:24] Speaker 1: I mean, think about what happened in Venezuela, like the way that the U.S. like intervened in Venezuela, the way that they're angling to intervene in Cuba, the way that they're cutting Cuba off right now, trying to curtail the sovereignty of these nations. You know, and people arrive to the U.S. like, you know, for for so many different reasons. There's been so much instability sowed in Latin America from the United States. And I think, you know, for Bad Bunny to just like take advantage of this platform, this very like, you know, one of the biggest platforms you can take in the United States and establish this Pan-American solidarity, fighting for, you know, our own proper identities, you know, as as not not just like as Latinos, but, you know, as people from different diasporas and cultures coming together and being like, you know what, we're we're going to be proud and we're not going to just fold into whatever makes people comfortable. And yeah, I think I think there was a lot of political significance to that.

[00:25:34] Speaker 2: So we are hearing and are going to be hearing people who complained about the show, who didn't like it for one reason or another. One of the Real Housewives, Jill Zarin, if that name means anything to you, reach back into your Wayback Machine. It doesn't. It was good. When she was complaining in a way that felt very familiar, which is to say it wasn't in English. I couldn't understand a word. Why would they make this choice on the 250th anniversary of the U.S.? I see you rolling your eyes already. And then also at one point said there's there weren't any white people on the field. This is an actual thing, she said. And then she complained about his dancing, which feels like an evergreen tweet, so to speak. Like there's always a mom somewhere who's like, but dancing, they grab their crotch. It's like, OK, we got it. But what do you think of like there's something so specific about those complaints, the language, the it's America's birthday. Why would you have something going on in Spanish?

[00:26:34] Speaker 1: I think the subtext is they're having a party and I wasn't invited, but they were invited. They just didn't take him up on the invitation. They thought they were too good to take him up on the invitation.

[00:26:48] Speaker 2: And I think like or they didn't think it was his to offer.

[00:26:52] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the nerve, again, being the number one most streamed artist in the world and performing at the Super Bowl. Like people need to understand, like, yes, there are there are problematic things about the founding principles of the United States. But how powerful is it that Bad Bunny was bagging groceries 10 years ago and could become a Super Bowl halftime headliner like in 10 years? And that is the beauty of America. That is the American dream. And I don't take that for granted. But to say that only, you know, specific kinds of people should be able to use the U.S. as like a as like an incubator for their dreams. I think that's so small minded. I think it's so high school, like grow up. People migrate, people migrate for so many reasons. And there are talented people in every ethnic group that you can think of. Why shouldn't they be able to grow their talents in the United States?

[00:28:08] Speaker 2: And why reject that part of the American story?

[00:28:12] Speaker 1: Exactly.

[00:28:13] Speaker 2: Tell people where they can find you in your work right now. Any socials, any newsletters? Where can people see what you're up to?

[00:28:22] Speaker 1: You can follow what I'm doing at Delos, which is our Latin culture section at the Los Angeles Times. It's where I'm an editor. And we also have some some plans for a podcast that are in the works. So you might be able to see the dark side. Yeah, you can read my work and in the L.A. Times, as well as magazines like Vogue, Elle, where I sometimes write features. So I really appreciate you having me on the show.

[00:28:57] Speaker 2: No, I'm glad. I'm glad. It's always nice to talk to somebody who has, like, you know, been there and really talk to the person. So thank you so much for being here, Susie Exposito. I appreciate you.

[00:29:08] Speaker 1: I appreciate you, Adi. Thank you. Thank you.