In a display of cultural might that left the grey, drizzly streets of Stratford quivering with Latin heat, the Puerto Rican phenomenon known as Bad Bunny (real name: Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, but let's not get bogged down in facts) descended upon London Stadium like a glittering, reggaeton-blasting meteor. The UK music industry, a collection of men in ill-fitting suits who have not had an original thought since the Beatles broke up, was reportedly 'thrilled' by the box office figures. Thrilled, you see. Because nothing says artistic triumph like a spreadsheet with a lot of zeros.
It was, by all accounts, a record-breaking show. 60,000 souls crammed into the former Olympic park, all screaming along to 'Tití Me Preguntó' and 'Dákiti' with a fervour usually reserved for England getting knocked out of a penalty shootout. The man himself, clad in what appeared to be a diamond-encrusted boiler suit and a pair of sunglasses that cost more than my annual gin budget, strutted, gyrated, and occasionally sang through a set that lasted nearly three hours. Three hours. That's longer than most marriages in the entertainment industry.
But let us not get carried away with the joy of it all. This is, after all, a nation that once treated the arrival of the Spice Girls as a diplomatic incident. The British music industry, a sort of moribund dinosaur that occasionally twitches and shits out a Lewis Capaldi album, has latched onto Bad Bunny like a life raft made of pure streaming revenue. ‘Record-breaking,’ they cry, clutching their spreadsheets. ‘Cultural exchange,’ they intone, ignoring the fact that the real cultural exchange is happening between the fans and the giant inflatable bunny that periodically descended from the ceiling to spray the crowd with what I sincerely hope was champagne.
There was, of course, the obligatory token British guest. Some poor soul from a band that had one hit in 2015 was dragged on stage to look bewildered while Bad Bunny politely humoured him. It was like watching a vicar trying to dance at a nightclub. The crowd, mercifully, ignored him.
And what of the music? Ah, the music. It was loud. It was bass-heavy. It was the sound of a planet that has decided that the future is not in Manchester indie bands or London grime, but in the syncopated, unapologetic hedonism of the Caribbean. Bad Bunny is not a singer, not really. He is a force. A hurricane of branding, a tsunami of TikTok dances, a… well, you get the metaphor. He is the biggest star on the planet, and the UK has finally, belatedly, realised that maybe, just maybe, the world does not revolve around their ability to produce a decent cup of tea.
The industry boffins will be parsing the numbers for weeks, trying to figure out how to replicate this success. They will fail, because you cannot replicate a star. You can only produce pale imitations: a Dua Lipa here, a Harry Styles there. The real magic, the kind that fills 60,000-seat stadiums in a foreign country, is a rare and precious thing. It is a bunny that bites, a rabbit that roars.
So raise a glass of warm, flat lager to Bad Bunny. He has reminded the UK that music is not just about the O2 Arena and the Mercury Prize. It is about joy. It is about movement. It is about watching 60,000 people lose their collective minds to a song about a man who is too busy for his girlfriend. That, dear reader, is the state of the union. And it is magnificent.
