Bad Bunny’s Debí Tirar Más Fotos Is a Living, Breathing Snapshot of Puerto Rico

    There are certain truisms that are hard to resist when talking about an album like Debí Debí Tirar Más Fotos, Bad Bunny’s sixth. The most significant is that this is a collection of songs that pay homage to the history of Puerto Rico, the homeland of its architect, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, who, after several years away, longs to return home. But as the album opens up, its narrative becomes even clearer: This is an expansive tribute to the archiving and safeguarding of cultures that has been—and continues to be—done not just in Puerto Rico, but in all corners of the planet. (Its title translate to “I Should Have Taken More Photos.”) As Bad Bunny comes home, so do we all.

    This is not the first time Benito has looked to the past, nor the first effort he has made to make his country proud: On 2024’s Una Velita, he reflected on the devastation wrought by Hurricane Maria in 2017 and Puerto Rico’s turbulent political climate. (Benito has been ardently political across the last year, campaigning for a pro-independence candidate in Puerto Rico’s gubernatorial elections.) But even before he became a global phenomenon, he mapped the journey of those who came before him onto his own pursuits: Between his 2018 debut, X 100pre, and Debí Tirar Más Fotos, lies a journey rooted in creative and political ancestry.

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