00:00Ice out the words of a blunt Bad Bunny, the Puerto Rican reggaeton star, in his acceptance speech at the Grammys, where he made history by becoming the first non, by winning best album with a non-English language release.
00:23The 31-year-old, who has quite a phenomenal week, taken from the Grammys to the halftime show of the Super Bowl next Sunday.
00:40Next Super Bowl halftime performer, three-time Grammy winner, Billboard's 2025 Artist of the Year.
00:46Puerto Rican musician Bad Bunny has become a sensation.
00:49Born Benito Antonio Martinez-Ocasio, the artist quickly climbed the charts since the release of his breakout single Soy Pior in 2017.
01:00To many fans, Bad Bunny's music meaningfully represents Latin culture on the global stage.
01:05I think he's a very important icon because he's one of the artists who helps ensure that Latinos are recognized for different kinds of things.
01:15We are always associated with a bad reputation or something, and it's good that through art we can begin to change the image that Latinos have.
01:27Bad Bunny has been politically outspoken, denouncing the Trump administration's immigration and customs enforcement operations.
01:33The artist decided not to perform in the U.S. during his 2025-26 tour, for fear that ICE agents would raid the concert venues.
01:42This is part of what has made Bad Bunny a divisive choice to perform at the NFL Super Bowl halftime show on February 8th, one of America's most high-profile stages.
01:53And that brings us to our Spotlight segment.
01:57And joining us from Birmingham, England, Ellis Cashmore, Professor of Sociology at Aston University, the author of Celebrity Culture.
02:11Thank you for being with us here on France 24.
02:14I'm delighted to be with you, Francois.
02:16When we talk about blunt words, well, let's take a listen to Bad Bunny Sunday night in his acceptance speech at the Grammys.
02:24Before I say thanks to God, I'm going to say, eyes out.
02:38We're not savages, we're not animals, we're not aliens, we are humans, and we are Americans.
02:51Ellis Cashmore, your reaction?
02:53I think we can expect more of that.
02:57You know, I'll be very, very surprised if during the halftime show at the Super Bowl, we don't get a similar kind of announcement.
03:06We are not animals, we are humans, we are Americans.
03:09Something along those lines.
03:11And let's not forget Green Day are also on.
03:14They're also very outspoken, anti-Trump.
03:16But I think all eyes will be, and ears, will be on this guy because something is going to happen.
03:23I'm pretty sure about that.
03:25And of course, it will be designed to humiliate, to embarrass, to criticize Donald Trump.
03:30The question is, of course, whether it will have any effect on Trump himself is pretty immune to criticism, as we know.
03:38We know that there's the Association Talking Points USA, which has decided to try and do an alternative halftime show.
03:45They haven't released any details about that.
03:48But this is one of those events, the Super Bowl, that brings together both sides of the culture wars, if you will.
03:57Well, it brings together the world, actually, Francois.
04:00They reckon that the viewing figures will be phenomenal, 130 million plus.
04:06I think there will probably be a few more for the halftime show specifically to watch what will happen, whether there will be any fireworks.
04:13So sport is, as you say, traditionally a kind of a healing event.
04:23And it does traditionally have a unifying effect on people.
04:27But on this occasion, of course, or perhaps not just on this occasion, but over the past five or 10 years, sport has become much more political than we used to.
04:38And the old idea about sport and politics being separate, I think, has been shown to be nonsense.
04:46And increasingly, sport has become a hugely influential platform for people to display, to exhibit their political and moral leanings.
04:57And it will be no different on Sunday.
04:59And there's a question of timing.
05:02Last year, when Bad Bunny refused to tour the United States, instead doing a residency in his native Puerto Rico, sending out a message, which, for those who are sympathetic to that message, they said, great.
05:15But now, this statement coming out, just as the United States is at daggers drawn over what's happening in Minnesota with ICE agents, the timing is something you couldn't write in it as script.
05:31Oh, yeah.
05:32No, no, you couldn't script this.
05:34This is absolutely perfect for the political activist entertainer.
05:38And he is one such being, he will use this as a stage, not just for his music, he'll use it as a stage for his politics.
05:48And let's face it, everybody knows this.
05:51Nobody in the world expects this to go off as just a musical event, like traditional halftime shows at the Super Bowl.
06:00Everybody is expecting something explosive.
06:03It doesn't happen.
06:04Let's face it, it'll be anticlimactic.
06:06Debbie Tirar-Masfotos, you listen to it, it's great music.
06:11And so the question is, would he have made history and become the first non-English speaker to win Best Album at the Grammys if there hadn't been Trump and ICE?
06:23He'd have been known, let's put it that way.
06:27He wouldn't have been known on a global scale.
06:29I don't think.
06:30What do I know about it?
06:31You know, it's not my generation.
06:32But I think he would have been a top rated entertainer, but not top tier as he has become.
06:42This is Sunday is his moment.
06:48He will become a notorious character, I think.
06:52He will be loved by half the world, hated by the other half, maybe.
07:00I just don't know how the world is split on Trump at the moment.
07:03But I do know one thing.
07:05It certainly is split.
07:07Yeah, it is split.
07:10And there are these two Americas and really these two worlds.
07:14And his music, which draws on a lot of influences, on reggaeton, but also on salsa and also on rap.
07:24It's not just one kind of music.
07:26And that's sort of a reflection of a certain...
07:29I'm sorry to interrupt you, Francois, but no music ever is completely apolitical.
07:36I mean, throughout the history of rock music, since the war, basically the end of the Second World War, the middle of the last century, music has been a conduit, a channel, a means through which people can express their political views.
07:51Not always popular views, often unpopular, deliberately unpopular, provocative even.
07:57But that's the whole point of rock music.
07:59And, you know, I know that this guy may not be in genre terms pure rock, I know, but, you know, I'm using the term generically now.
08:07The whole field of rock music has been suffused, saturated in political views, opinion, perspectives, and activism.
08:24And this guy is carrying on, he's extending what is a very still alive tradition.
08:32And, of course, the politics of today, as we've just pointed out, are so divisive that it's almost tailor-made for music to rush in and say, this is what we feel.
08:44This is what young people are thinking and feeling about the world today.
08:49They think we'll know all about it on Sunday.
08:51Yeah.
08:51One final question on this exact point, Ellis, which is musicians being activists, that's nothing new, as you say.
09:02But the NFL knew what it was doing when it booked Bad Bunny.
09:07I think they were being mischievous.
09:08So why did they do it?
09:11I think they were being mischievous.
09:13I mean, they knew exactly what they were getting.
09:17This isn't a shot in the dark.
09:19You know, let's just pull somebody out of the air.
09:22Oh, this guy Bad Bunny is getting a lot of attention.
09:25Let's put him on.
09:26No.
09:27They knew all about him.
09:28They do their homework.
09:30They've investigated his background and say, this will get an awful lot of publicity.
09:37And it has, of course.
09:38Here we are discussing it right now, five days ahead of schedule.
09:42And so they knew that this was not going to be an anodyne, shall we say, halftime show.
09:50This was going to be a very volatile occasion, explosive.
09:56That's what they wanted.
09:57I mean, you know, the people who organize these things don't just want a dull affair in which people say, oh, yeah, another so-so indifferent halftime show.
10:10We'll forget it by within 24 hours.
10:13This will be an event, they hope, that will be not forgotten for several months, if not years.
10:19Ellis Cashmore, so many thanks for joining us from Birmingham.
10:22My pleasure.
10:23My pleasure.
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