Bad Bunny’s “Trellas” — what (rock) stars are made of
Given that rock was the first music genre to be socially accepted as an icon of rebellion (for reasons that are beyond the scope of this review), it’s not that weird that the expression “rock star” became a common one to define iconoclastic musicians and performers, even when they do not make rock music. But, well, sometimes they do too.
It’s case the case of singer and songwriter Bad Bunny, the reggaeton king that doesn’t really limit his musicality. In 2/3 of the (all great) albums he released in 2020, he’s experimented with rock music in tracks like “Hasta Mañana”, from the album YHLQMDLG, and “Yo visto así”, from the album “El último tour del mundo”.
However, it is with the dreamy “Trellas”, from the latter album, that the talented Puerto-Rican positions as the rock star that he’s worthy of going down in history as, in all his versatility and grandiose.
“Trellas” relies on acoustic guitar and synthesized sounds to evoke simplicity and celestial vibes, as Bad Bunny sings about travelling through space and being unable to forget a lover.
Just like in other psychedelic songs such as “Flores Astrais” (“Astral Flowers”), from Brazilian early progressive rock band Secos & Molhados, “Trellas” also mixes poetic lyrics — like “Yo seguire buscando mil anos luz” (“I will keep on searching, a thousand lightyears”) — with metaphors that cross the line between funny and ethereal — like “Tuve sexo com marcianas” (“I had sex with women from Mars”). The line sounds reasonably fit and quite literally larger than life as everything else about “Trellas”.
OBS: If you’re into astrology, it doesn’t come as a surprise either that Bad Bunny, a Pisces, would write a song like that.
Escapist and made of simple and effective songwriting, “Trellas” fits Bad Bunny’s career momentum and the concept of the album, which, according to the singer and rapper, would be his last. Hopefully it’s not true — but if it is, “Trellas” is as ethereal as a farewell from a legend should be, echoing through space as the type of art or artist we don’t want to say goodbye to.
