(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BAD BUNNY: (Singing in Spanish).
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Sunday's Super Bowl halftime show with Bad Bunny included a lot of Easter eggs - you know, little surprises - mostly talking about the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, where he grew up. In conversation, I realized some people got the references and some didn't. So we've called an expert, NPR Music's Anamaria Sayre, and we did a lightning round, naming things in the show, starting with rows of sugarcane on the football field.
ANAMARIA SAYRE, BYLINE: Oh, I love this game. OK. The plants, this is just a very clear visual identifier of Puerto Rico. He loves to bring the natural landscape of Puerto Rico. It's also fun that there were real people.
INSKEEP: People playing dominoes.
SAYRE: The most classic of Puerto Rican games. It's an image - everyone from the oldest to the youngest love this game.
INSKEEP: I also noticed a lot of plastic chairs.
SAYRE: Oh, the plastic chairs. There's a lot to be said. So this is actually a main image from his last album, "Debí Tirar Más Fotos." It was the image featured on the cover of the album to show something that's usually used in Puerto Rico, at outside gatherings, family functions. Also, the image of the kid falling asleep on the plastic chairs, that is, like, the most identifiable Latino image.
INSKEEP: (Laughter).
SAYRE: You get your Latino card as a kid when you fall asleep on the plastic chairs.
INSKEEP: Wow. I know you've been up a lot working. Hopefully, you'll get to sleep on a plastic chair soon.
SAYRE: (Laughter).
INSKEEP: But let me ask first about the light poles.
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BAD BUNNY: (Rapping in Spanish).
SAYRE: OK, so the light poles is a pretty explicit reference to the electrical issues in Puerto Rico. It's one of the most difficult things in Puerto Rico, the apagones, the blackouts that they constantly face. For him to use that moment, getting on top of those light poles to tell the world that it's amazing to be Latino, I mean, wow, that's a really striking visual.
INSKEEP: Let me ask next about the woman who, in the middle of the show, poured him a shot at a bar.
SAYRE: Oh, she's an absolute beloved Puerto Rican icon. Her name is Toñita, and she is the owner and founder of the Caribbean Social Club in Williamsburg in New York. It's like the watering hole for all the Puerto Ricans in New York, a huge nod to Boricua culture, the diaspora living in New York City, which hasn't always been acknowledged or celebrated really until now.
INSKEEP: Next, other music stars who kept appearing.
SAYRE: So we had Lady Gaga, which this one was controversial. Some people said that this was his attempt to pander to a wider American audience. What I say is it was him flipping the traditional Latino crossover. He had Lady Gaga on, singing her hit song but with a salsa arrangement. The other feature here was Ricky Martin.
This was an especially heartfelt one, Steve, because Ricky Martin famously crossed over into a U.S. market, was one of the first from Puerto Rico to do it. And in order to do so, he really had to conform to what people thought a mainstream U.S. audience would want to experience. What we saw on Sunday night was effectively Bad Bunny giving Ricky Martin the opportunity to be his most Boricua self. What he did was sing Bad Bunny's most political song off his last album, "Lo Que Paso A Hawaii," in Spanish.
INSKEEP: I don't think there was a lot of explicit political messaging in this show, which is appropriate. But it did seem that he was expressing a view of the world.
SAYRE: You know, Steve, it's almost hard to say that it wasn't explicitly political, because in many ways, it was. I mean, this is Benito's style. He's not going to stand up onstage, as he actually did at the Grammys a week ago in his speech, and condemn ICE. What he's going to do is show the beauty of Latin American labor, show how that's the building blocks of America. He's going to show the beauty of Latin American unity.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BAD BUNNY: God bless America...
(CHEERING)
BAD BUNNY: ...Sea Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay...
SAYRE: Taking this moment on the biggest stage in the United States to decenter the United States and show that America includes all of us.
INSKEEP: Anamaria Sayre, it's always a pleasure talking with you.
SAYRE: Same here, Steve. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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