Within the days and weeks main as much as Dangerous Bunny’s Tremendous Bowl halftime present, a nervous type of hype swept America. The 31-year-old artist is, by some measures, the most well-liked working musician on the earth. However as a result of he virtually solely performs in Spanish and has spoken up towards ICE, right-wing commentators recommended he was too political for the time slot, whereas branding him with numerous scary synonyms like “provocative” and “divisive.” Only a few hours earlier than the present, the influencer Jake Paul known as him “a pretend American citizen performing who publicly hates America.”
Throughout his efficiency on Sunday evening, Dangerous Bunny had a solution for that final one: “God bless America,” he introduced. However his whole efficiency rebuked the notion that he’s some culture-war proxy being foisted upon an American public that desires its stars to close up and sing. Sure, he crammed this present with slogans and symbols signalling Puerto Rican and Latino delight at a time when federal brokers are menacing Spanish audio system and President Trump has declared English to be the nationwide language. However essentially, the halftime was a blast: an instant-classic, exactly detailed, relentlessly stimulating medley rooted within the good-old-fashioned pleasure precept.
Dangerous Bunny opened in what regarded like sugar cane fields labored by dancers dressed within the straw hats of jíbaros (Puerto Rico’s rural farmers). Towards this pastoral backdrop, Dangerous Bunny stood trying fashionable and fly, in a boxy white shirt patterned like an NFL jersey. He was rapping in Spanish to his smash “Tití Me Preguntó,” however the pigskin he held in his hand and the tie round his neck conveyed a transparent message to any viewer. He was right here for enterprise. He was right here to play ball.
Play he did. As he walked by the tropical hedge maze, he handed by whimsical set items together with a coconut vendor, a dominoes match, and a building web site manned by—how one can put this respectfully—scorching ladies. This was the primary of many awooga visuals to return—mass twerking, a fleeting shot of guy-on-guy grinding, and Dangerous Bunny executing his trademark crotch thrust. If any of this conjures up scandal, it’ll be the wholesome type, giving America a break from fascism discourse to rehash now-quaint-seeming dustups brought on by the likes of Elvis, Janet Jackson, and Prince (the originator of what’s turning into a hallowed custom of Tremendous Bowl halftime crotchroversies).
Actually, what does it say concerning the state of the nation that the sight of excellent trying folks doing slinky choreography feels … refreshing? It’s not just like the much-publicized conservative cultural wave of the 2020s has rolled again popular culture’s reliance on raunch. However this efficiency’s wealth of gyration appeared subtly throw-backy and weirdly healthful. Possibly that was as a result of the grins on everybody’s faces conveyed sexiness with out porniness. The dancing and costumes took me again to being a younger teen watching the airbrushed sultriness of early 2000s MTV and being intrigued by the world that allegedly existed someplace exterior my dwelling.
Dangerous Bunny was certainly attempting to take viewers out of their dwelling, and into his. The sheer quantity of references to Puerto Rico defied any notion that the island is a minor participant in American tradition; fairly, we have been reminded that it’s a powerhouse home and world exporter. Puerto Rico gave us the archetypal reggaeton hit, Daddy Yankee’s “Gasolina,” which popped up for a couple of moments tonight. Its musicians helped invent salsa music—which supplied much-needed syncopation when Woman Gaga appeared to sing her usually plodding hit “Die With a Smile.” It gave us the sq. jaw and honeyed voice of Ricky Martin, who sang as effectively. And it gave us the evening’s headliner, who nodded on the significance of his personal success when he handed a Grammy to a boy who regarded like he may develop as much as in the future be, effectively, Dangerous Bunny.
Finally, the vitality of the efficiency shifted from occasion to assertion piece—but sensible stagecraft made that shift really feel climactic fairly than deflating. Exploding energy strains evoked {the electrical} outages which have plagued Puerto Rico lately. For many of the present, Dangerous Bunny had been mugging merrily to the digital camera, flaring his eyes and making hammy gestures for example his phrases. However now anger appeared to twitch in his face as he rapped his tune “El Apagón” (“The Energy Outage”). By way of have an effect on alone, he bought throughout a way of betrayal that many Puerto Ricans of his age—generally known as the “disaster technology”—have spoken of feeling after a string of political scandals and pure disasters amid ongoing gentrification by mainlanders.
That message was, certainly, political. So was his culminating assertion of “God bless America,” which he adopted by itemizing nations in North and South America, thereby asserting the transnational nature of the tradition that he represents. Pushing towards the digital camera with throngs of drummers, he closed by holding up a soccer with a message on it: “Collectively, We Are America.” It was a pointed message but in addition a conciliatory one, a unity slogan. Some folks have been going to search for a battle anyway. “No person understands a phrase this man is saying,” complained Donald Trump on Reality Social, minutes after the efficiency, “and the dancing is disgusting.”
