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In the early ’90s, the club and hip-hop collective the Noise released a series of influential mixtapes that would mark the dawn of reggaeton’s foundational style. Reggaeton may trace its roots back to Panama, but it was in San Juan that the genre crystallized into the music we know today. Like him, the then-nascent Panamanian scene never bloomed in the way it should have. Similarly to Renato, Chicho Man, and other talents from his generation who turned barrios into creative hubs in Panama, Nando Boom had a lack of resources and industry investment. Nando Boom remained in his native Panama throughout his career and plateaued before the rest of the world could catch up to him. Problematic factors aside, though, its significance is undeniable in parlaying an early sound into a landscape-shifting new movement. The Spanish-language take on Shabba Ranks’ 1990 dancehall track was the first and last time Nando Boom veered in this direction, and it’s the song he’s most known for-unlike his early romántico tracks, this song mimicks the homophobic, bullying nature of Ranks’ original. The prolific riddim-created by a collective of Jamaican and Panamanian producers in New York-caused a since-unstoppable ripple effect and laid the foundation for Puerto Rican underground, reggaeton, and Dominican dembow. On “Ellos Benia,” the Panamanian MC Nando Boom debuted the pronounced boom-ch-boom-chick dembow beat that drives seemingly every reggaeton track to this day. He now evokes nostalgia as a pioneer and reminds us how important it can be to color outside the lines. El General is considered a flag-bearer for the enormous scene that would unfold. And while neither were quite on the nose in defining the nebulous sound, everyone agreed there was no going back. Some erroneously called “Tu Pum Pum” “ Latin rap cumbia,” while others anchored its place in history as the first Spanish-language dancehall song to make it onto U.S. “Tu Pum Pum,” as well as “Muévelo” and “Te Ves Buena,” are classics in Franco’s limited but impactful discography. (This was just a year after Vico C started making moves in Brooklyn.) Underground would then coalesce into reggaeton in New York and Puerto Rico. That rhythm served as a precursor to Puerto Rico’s underground, molded by plena and hip-hop en español.
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It was one of El General (born Edgardo Franco)’s first hits, and the onset of a revolution: The riddim (in which we hear Jamaican producer Karl Miller heavily sample Little Lenny’s “Punnany Tegereg”) highlights the drum that bounces off the song’s dancehall core, whispering a blueprint that would later be refined into the reggaeton we know today. The sonic backbone of “Tu Pum Pum” is a familiar one, derived from Jamaican dancehall-only now, its rhythm was coupled with Spanish-language, dancefloor-ready words.
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Our selection of songs is by no means definitive, but rather a curated introduction to a complex and ever-changing movement. There are endless sonic offshoots and subgenres that are also part of this story, like the brega funk-inspired styles dominating Brazil’s pop charts today or the bachata-reggaetón concoctions that once ruled airwaves in the mid-’00s. While these include chart-toppers and social milestones, our writers also wanted to document an alternate history of these movements-one that shines some light on its black, queer, feminist, and political origins and futures, in the hopes of highlighting some of the voices who are often pushed out of the mainstream. We’ve curated a collection of tracks for each of these genres, ordered chronologically, in an attempt to show how the music has evolved over time. These genres represent thriving movements with profound histories and specialized sounds: reggaeton’s driving riddims, melodic refrains, and rapid-fire rhymes Dominican dembow’s addictive, hyperspeed hooks champeta urbana’s collision of hip-hop and Congolese and South African folk hip-hop en español’s rap reimaginings for Spanish speakers Latin trap’s gritty bravado and baile funk’s irresistible remixing of Miami bass and hip-hop. Here, to open a discussion on urbano, we will focus on six of the movement’s pillars: reggaeton, hip-hop en español, Latin trap, dembow, champeta urbana, and Brazilian funk (or baile funk, as it’s Anglicized in the U.S.).