Bad Bunny’s ‘Debí Tirar Más Fotos’ could make Grammy history

NEW YORK (AP):

Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny has redefined what it means to be a global giant, and he may once again make history at the 2026 Grammy Awards.

The artiste, born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, is up for six awards at the February 1 show, becoming the first Spanish-language artiste to be nominated for Album, Song and Record of the Year simultaneously. His critically acclaimed album, Debí Tirar Más Fotos, is only the second Spanish-language record to be nominated for Album of the Year. The first? Well, that also belonged to Bad Bunny, 2022’s Un Verano Sin Ti.

Win or lose, experts say Bad Bunny’s Grammy nominations mark a symbolic moment for Latinos. Just a week later, after all, he’ll headline the Super Bowl halftime show.

Vanessa Díaz, associate professor of Chicano and Latino studies at Loyola Marymount University and co-author of “P FKN R: How Bad Bunny Became the Global Voice of Puerto Rican Resistance,” said Bad Bunny’s nods extend beyond his own art and serve as a “very welcome recognition of Latin music that is growing”.

“Music from the Spanish-speaking Caribbean has been shaping global music tastes since the 19th century,” added Albert Laguna, associate professor of ethnicity, race and migration and American studies at Yale. “Bad Bunny is another link in a much longer chain of the popularity of Caribbean music on a global stage.”

Much of this music, particularly Latin trap and reggaetón, the genres Bad Bunny got his start in and continues to use in his new work, has been historically criminalised in Puerto Rico, not unlike hip-hop in the United States. Reggaetón in particular, Díaz pointed out, “comes from the most marginalised communities in Puerto Rico. And so, the fact that Bad Bunny is receiving nominations in three main categories, and this is an artiste who came up with trap … is the most groundbreaking thing about the entire situation”.

APPEAL

Across Debí Tirar Más Fotos, Bad Bunny and his producers weave traditional Puerto Rican folkloric styles into a hyper-contemporary context. Latin trap and reggaetón are fused with música jíbara, salsa, bomba, plena and even aguinaldo, a kind of Christmas music, in Pitorro de Coco. While Bad Bunny’s previous albums also fused different genres, this album’s melange was more homegrown.

Laguna sees Debí Tirar Más Fotos as a direct challenge to the prevailing “formula for global pop stardom”, which he describes as an artiste making it locally, gaining traction and then “watering down” their sound into something commercial and palatable for a global audience.

“Bad Bunny went in the opposite direction. It’s his most Puerto Rican album ever,” said Laguna. He hopes it will communicate to other artistes that they, too, can look to their ancestry and history for artmaking.

The timing of the album’s release and recognition, too, feels consequential. Latinos and the Spanish-speaking community in the US have grown increasingly wary amid growing anti-immigrant sentiment and raids, as President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and executive actions have vastly expanded who is eligible for deportation and routine hearings have turned into deportation traps for migrants.

In an interview with i-D Magazine earlier this year, Bad Bunny mentioned that concerns around the mass deportations of Latinos factored into his decision not to tour in the continental US.

“The content of the lyrics – which are so steeped in the history of Puerto Rico, political histories, tourism and gentrification – there’s so much rich political and historical content,” Díaz added. “This album is historic even without a Grammy win.”

But if Bad Bunny does win, Díaz said, it will be “akin to Halle Berry being the first black woman to win an Oscar. That was a watershed moment. Or Rita Moreno being the first Latina to win”.

The 68th Grammy Awards will be held February 1, 2026, at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.