Bad Bunny’s Hopeful Nostalgia

Nostalgia can be as painful as it is healing. Like a good prophet, Bad Bunny knows which experience of nostalgia to feed his people.

Both kinds of nostalgia have shaped Puerto Ricans’ perceptions of themselves and their future. Since the 1940s and ’50s, when Puerto Ricans were pressured by Operation Bootstrap to move from the archipelago, this yearning for home has been part of their exile. Even those who manage to stay in Puerto Rico struggle with complicated feelings of “paradise lost.” This emotion is so formative to Puerto Ricans that the National Foundation for Popular Culture includes in their archives a category of music labeled “nostalgia.”

Continuing this tradition, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS (translation: I Should Have Taken More Photos)—the sixth studio album from Puerto Rican rapper, singer, and songwriter Bad Bunny—is an exercise in nostalgia that heals. The album’s title frames the music around themes of memory, loss, and the hope to recover the magic of a present long past. The titular phrase is so commonplace that people beyond Puerto Rico will recognize the ache it describes.

The emotional weight of the title pairs with the painfully and equally commonplace photo of two empty plastic chairs in a lush Puerto Rican backyard that serves as the album’s cover. For Puerto Ricans, the image evokes those lost to migration or death. Bad Bunny told the New York Times that this was his “most Puerto Rican album yet,” so it is no surprise that Boricua fans took to social media to share photos and stories of the pets, family, and friends that once occupied the empty chairs in their lives. The viral trend quickly expanded beyond Puerto Rico. We all recognize that ache. Yet this album aims to heal, not harm.

The opening song “NUEVAYoL” (a playful twist on “New York”) begins with a sample of El Gran Combo’s 1975 orchestral salsa “Un Verano en Nueva York” (“A Summer in New York”) before dropping into an aggressive Dominican dembow rhythm, highlighting the unique fusion of Caribbean diaspora in the city. Reactions online show that this opening produced an emotive, intergenerational experience of cultural memory, as elders narrated the significance of that sample. Puerto Ricans far from home felt seen and embraced.

With DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, elders and youth, diaspora and islanders, are all encouraged to dance, share stories, and remember their bonds. The joy of remembering and belonging grows as listeners are delighted with several fusions of old and new genres. Polyrhythmic percussion used to make autochthonous genres like plena and bomba mix with the modern trappings of reggaeton and electronica to produce songs like “EL CLúB,” PIToRRO DE COCO,” and the titular track. Bad Bunny takes his audience on a journey through the folkloric music that has made Puerto Rico, ending with “EoO,” the track that pays homage to early 2000s reggaeton and samples Tito El Bambino. According to the artist, “EoO”’s inclusion emphasizes that reggaeton belongs to that sonic history. New and old, digital and analogue, in DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS these are made one.

This intergenerational mosaic is reflected also in the album’s production and marketing. Hits like the brassy, six-minute-long salsa “BAILE INoLVIDABLE” (“Unforgettable Dance”) feature instrumentation by students from the Escuela Libre de Música in San Juan. The short film that accompanies the album, starring 90-year-old Jacobo Morales, Puerto Rico’s only Oscar-nominated director, tackles the predatory gentrification that jeopardizes Puerto Rico’s elders and native animals alike (in this case, el sapo concho). Produced nearly entirely in Puerto Rico, using images and symbols core to the culture, every detail is meant to revive national pride and hope. DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS is deeply nostalgic.

For a people fearful they are losing their home, their culture, and their ties to one another, the album reminds them to hope. The memories evoked are not meant to solely point backwards. Bad Bunny has taken to heart the lesson of Ecclesiastes’ teacher: “Do not say, ‘Why were the old days better than these?’ For it is not wise to ask such questions.” Instead, by drawing together the old and new, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS practices the kind of nostalgia that imagines a future where traditions survive and the peoples’ bonds are not ruptured. The album imagines a Puerto Rico restored, free, and flourishing.

Such a message resonates with a prophetic biblical story. After God’s people returned from their exile in Babylon (and later Persia), they began to rebuild Jerusalem. The prophet Haggai admonishes them to prioritize restoring the temple, but after a month of construction, the Israelites are discouraged. The elders among them remember the grandeur of Solomon’s temple; their building pales in comparison. The project falters under the weight of a painful nostalgia. To this feeling, Haggai offers these words: “‘Be strong, all you people of the land,’ declares the Lord, ‘and work. For I am with you,’ declares the Lord Almighty. ‘This is what I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt. And my Spirit remains among you. Do not fear.’”

Haggai moves the people to collectively work toward their restoration because they have divine solidarity. He encourages a different kind of memory, pointing to God’s presence with Israel since the days of their escape from Egyptian slavery. “I am with you” is a character-marking promise of God, one that privileges the poor, the disenfranchised, and the abject.

Jesus repeats this promise before his ascension: “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” He then commissions his Spirit to be with his followers, just as Haggai promised. For Puerto Ricans, as with all people estranged by injustice, Haggai’s prophetic word should condition their memory and orient their energy. The God that was with discouraged exiles who could not imagine their nation fully restored is the same God who is with Puerto Ricans hoping to realize their dream island home. The prophetic imagination remembers hope, even as it warns and critiques.

Some Christian leaders see in Bad Bunny a Puerto Rican prophet. These leaders affirm the hope as much as they do its inherent warning, highlighting the fourteenth track of DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, “LO QUE LE PASÓ A HAWAii” (“What Happened to Hawaii”), as central to the album’s message. This song warns that Puerto Ricans could be dispossessed of their home, like Hawaiians before them, if they do not remember to carry their flags and sing el lelolai (traditional Christmas music).

Healing nostalgia gives hope. Hope intermingles with warning. Together they produce a collective will to work under the conditioned memory that God is with those the world has abused. “‘Be strong . . . and work. For I am with you,’ declares the Lord Almighty.”

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At Think Christian, we encourage careful cultural discernment. We recognize and respect that many Christians choose not to engage with pop culture that contains particular content, such as abuse, sex, violence, alcohol or drug use, or that employs the use of coarse language. To that end, we suggest visiting Common Sense Media for detailed information regarding the content of the particular pieces of pop culture discussed in this article.