[music playing]
Hello, friends.
Hispanic Heritage Month just wrapped up.
But before we go, I want to talk about reggaeton.
And if you don't know what it is,
you've probably heard the unmistakable beat of reggaeton
before, especially if you have upstairs neighbors.
[banging]
MAN: Can you keep it down up there?
I will not!
Like this song.
The roots of this music go back as far as the '70s
and as far south as Panama.
It could have started further south,
but the beats are so big-- they don't fit through the canal.
It was here in the 1980s when music artists started putting
Spanish lyrics over Jamaican dancehall songs,
creating a new sound of reggae in español.
And, honestly, I'm glad I wasn't there.
Because watching Spanish words and dancehall music
coming together for the first time,
that'd been too sexy to handle.
There's no way you didn't leave that dance floor too pregnant.
It's like being the jelly in a Diego
Luna and Bad Bunny sandwich.
Ooh, delicious.
Two of reggaeton's earliest pioneers
were Leonardo Renato Aulder and Edgardo Franco.
Franco would later be known as El General
and even looked like if the Fresh
Prince got sent to military school instead of Bel Air.
These two and other artists grew their new sounds
by giving tapes to bus drivers, who would bump their music.
It's basically the way rappers in Atlanta
give their singles to strip club DJs.
Except in this case, you hope people jam out to your music
while running late for work.
In 1985, El General moved to New
York City, where he began spreading
early reggaeton in the clubs.
It almost didn't happen, though,
because while he was in New York,
El General also pursued a degree
in business administration in an effort to get a real job.
You have to wonder, what if that path had worked out?
He'd been in an office going, Ernst and Young,
this is El General speaking.
How may I direct your call?
Thankfully, he was sucked back into music, hosting
parties and performing.
In 1990, he put out the song, "Tu Pum Pum," a tribute
to the power of the puss-ay.
[meow]
EDGARDO FRANCO: [singing in spanish]
And El General's cover blew up.
It was a hit in mainland America and Puerto Rico
and spread to Central and South America.
The music was spreading so fast-- it
would have made COVID jealous.
Not too far from Brooklyn, on Long Island, the defining beat
of reggaeton, the dembow rhythm,
was popularized by Panamanian rapper Nando Boom.
The sound was originally created
by Jamaican dancehall musician Shabba Ranks,
who looks like if Blade became a DJ
instead of fighting vampires.
From there, the sound moved to a different long island,
Puerto Rico.
And here is where all the Panamanian and New York
ingredients finally mixed together
to make something special, like sofrito for your ears.
It took off at a club called The Noise,
founded by the Quincy Jones of reggaeton, DJ Negro.
He had been selling hot dogs on the street to get by,
and then had an idea to start a club.
It was there that the genre became known as El
Underground, and created a whole new generation
of artists like Ivy Queen.
They also popularized reggaeton's
most famous dance, perreo.
Oh!
I know this dance.
This is just me in 2005.
This is the dance you do when you
don't want to pay for drinks.
At one point, Puerto Rico's government
cracked down on El Underground and tried
to regulate the lyrics and perreo dance moves.
But all that did was make El Underground more popular.
This was like when your parents told you not to date somebody,
but then that person gets abs.
I'm sorry, mama.
You makes some good points.
But I can wash clothes off his stomach.
Later, the genre exploded all over mainstream
with the release of the hit song, "Gasolina"
by Daddy Yankee in 2004.
And Daddy Yankee was everywhere--
MTV, Time magazine, even the campaign trail.
I just want to say thank you, Daddy Yankee.
That's right.
You know a genre is big when the old, white
Republicans start calling.
For a little while, reggaeton was huge.
But then record companies moved on,
and it disappeared in much of America, which basically means
most Americans thought it didn't exist anymore,
like a baby who falls for peekaboo,
but with Latin music.
But even as America forgot about it,
reggaeton went through a rebirth in Medellín,
Colombia, the city you recognize from Narcos.
Colombian artists like J Balvin, Reykon, and Karol G
gave reggaeton a new, more mainstream sound, with lyrics
that focus less on violence and more on sex and romance,
like if Neo became Neo.
It grew and grew in popularity until America
caught on again with--
(SINGING) Despacito.
DULCE SLOAN: That's right.
Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee took over the globe
with "Despacito."
It was number one for 16 weeks.
This song was so popular--
even racists were learning Spanish.
Como se dice, go back to your own country?
And since "Despacito," reggaeton has kept its hold
in America, which is great.
Because this is a genre that is still evolving
and becoming more inclusive.
You know, it grew out of a rich Hispanic heritage of--
[banging]
Oh, seriously, that neighbor again?
Hey, sorry about before, but can you actually turn it up?
Everyone downstairs started dancing,
and I just want to keep the party going.
OK, I don't know how you got in here, but sure.
Can we turn it up, please?
Thank you.
No thank you. - All right.
OK.
You can get out now.
Hoo.
[cheering]