Five years ago this Friday (May 27), “Despacito” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and made global history. The instant-classic single (Universal Music Latino), already a runaway smash in its ...

Movements are never the product of a single action. And yet many of the recent developments in Latin music are labeled pre- or post-“Despacito.” In the summer of 2017, this juggernaut of a song ...

“Despacito”—Luis Fonsi’s chart-topping, record-setting reggaeton hit from 2017—first came together over the course of a single afternoon. “We wrote the song out of a guitar,” says Ender of the ...

I didn’t expect that, amidst chants of “build the wall,” the song of the summer would be predominantly Spanish — only the third Spanish-language song to reach number one on the Hot 100. At the time of ...

In The Number Ones, I'm reviewing every single #1 single in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, starting with the chart's beginning, in 1958, and working my way up into the present. Book Bonus Beat: ...

Apart from its nearly unprecedented success, the most remarkable thing about Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee‘s 2017 global smash hit “Despacito” may be how quickly it came together. Today (Tuesday, March ...