Daddy Yankee: The World Before Reggaeton

Joseph, I think we're about to usher in a becoming an icon.

First, wait, the first time that we've not had Margarita's before starting?

Okay, stop, we do not drink Margarita's before we record the podcast. Okay, we don't. Don't listen to him, y'all, he's been drinking. The first time we've covered an artist who's currently retired.

Whoa well, I mean, Nikki retired, Doja retired? Then they kept making music? How long is that gonna last?

Facts? But this artist made a promise to Baby Jesus about it?

Right? I believe it when I see it, or when I don't hear anything, I guess. But shouldn't we introduce who we're talking about?

A good call? So today's icon is the King of Regathon a big Box, otherwise known as Daddy Yankee, who announced his retirement from the biz back in twenty twenty two.

And then said it goodbye to a roaring crowd at his final clonsert in its native Puerto Rico. Last year.

He said that he's stepping away from music to focus on his Christianity, which sounds a little surprising coming from the guy who wrote saban as Blancas along.

We've countless other booty shaking bangers over the course of three whole decades and over thirty million albums sold.

It's more than enough success to totally justify hanging it up. But you know us, we are never ready to say goodbye to our icons again.

I will believe it when I don't hear it, all right, don't see it.

Point is possibly more than I think any other icon we've covered. We're living in the world Daddy Yankee built right now. Irl.

That is a very bold statement, Chica.

I know, but think about it, Okay, just like stay with me here. There is the world before Reggaton and the world after Reggathon, and who was right there when we changed over?

Who else but El exactly.

And to be clear, it's not to say that he invented reggathon. We're going to have more on that in just a little bit for all you music historians.

But basically, without Daddy Yankee, your weekly New Music Friday playlist would look very different.

My workout playlist would basically be unrecognizable. I mean, like my get Ready remix Forgetting Done Done. So my point is this, Daddy Yankee brought Reggaton to the masses and played a massive role in shaping the genre.

Let's take a look at how the King of Reggathon earned his thrown.

I'm your host Lillianavasquez and I'm Joseph Carrio and this is Becoming an Icon Week, the podcast where we give you the rundown on how today's most famous Latin X stars have shaped pop culture.

And given the world some extra couple.

Sit back and get comfortable.

Because we are going in the only way we know how with when I view us, when assays.

And a lot of opinions as we relive their greatest achievements on our journey to find out what makes them still iconic.

Before we dive in, let's mix it up a little bit remake to understand how Daddy Yankee became the icon that he is today, you kind of need to understand when and where he came of age Puerto Rico's underground music scene of the nineteen nineties.

Daddy Yankee didn't invent Ragaeton. Rayton is a product of the MC and DJ's remixing and experimenting with dancehall beats that originated in Jamaica and other largely Afro Caribbean islands.

Hence the reggae part of Reggathon.

I actually didn't know that really.

See listen, always learning, always learning, forever a student. Okay, So from there you would think that the music just kind of like made its way across Haiti in the dr and landed smack dab in Puerto Rico. But it's a little bit more roundabout than that.

Before we keep going, this is just going to be a quick primer for the non Regaton scholars. Listen. If you really want to go deep, you'll want to check out loud The History of Reggaeton, another great podcast hosted by Regaeton Roy y'll t lativ coween.

And by the way, like I'm not asking you to turn off our podcast right now, but as soon as ours is over, goes straight to that immediately. What we're about to give you is just a little Regaton appetizer, just a little app you know, to give you a sense of the singular moment in musical history that Daddy Yankee was a part of. So before where too Rican reggaethon, there was reggae in Espanol and that came from Panama.

What a twist, Okay.

So here's how it happened. So, the famous Panama Canal was dug largely by West Indian and especially Jamaican immigrant labor, and after the canal was finished, the workers and their families settled down in Panama City and formed a really tight immigrant community.

The clubs or dance halls all of this community played music that was similar to reggae, but a few ticks faster and with harder beats.

And at these dance halls, young artists like DJ Renato, Reggae Sam and DJ Franchito hyped the crowd in Spanish. Thus reggae in Espanol was born.

Soon they started recording Spanish language covers of popular dancehall songs along with original tracks, and just like that, reggae en Espanol found its way to Spanish speaking islands like Puerto Rico.

Just as Ramon Ayala Junior, the boy who would go on to be known as Daddy Yankee, was beginning to develop an interest in American hip hop, which you might say is the second ingredient in Puerto Rican reggaton, but more on that later.

So that's the short one.

Was beginning to develop an interest in America.

In Hi regaton will cross borders and become something else entirely. Now, without further ado, let's your turn to our leading man.

Ramon Ayala Junior was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on February third, nineteen seventy six. Joseph, want to go like full flow Alder Mercado on this one for bodingen.

Maybe okay ah Caia, you little rule breaker with your son in Aquarius, you're not afraid to push the envelope in the name of innovation.

You want to do things your way, and your fullest surprise is hi berro mira la lunin pieces with your moon in Pisces. You're not above insecurity and passivity, but don't wait and see embrace your creativity and you'll reap the rewards of your imagination.

The cape suits you, Joseph, it really does you know what I mean? I mean we're looking for two point zero. We're looking for two point zero now. Ramon Ayala's father, Ramon Senior, was a bongo player for salsa artists in the area, making Daddy Yankee. I think our third icon in a row this season to have a musician as a parent.

Mm hmm. His mother Rosa. Meanwhile, was a beautician who also came from a family of musicians. Ramond Junior, aka future Daddy Yankee, would years later describe his mother as a fighter.

And she's the one who actually introduced him to American pop artist of the nineteen eighties, most importantly, Michael Jackson.

Perhaps even more than his music, the King of Pop's lavish cinema videos made a huge impression on Dramon Junior. He cites Jackson as an artist who showed him what it meant to be an entertainer, from his work ethic to his charisma.

Just picture young little Daddy Yankee. Like that sounds so weird, Little Daddy Yankee. Okay, so the picture a young Ramon huddled around the TV set with his two brothers. This family of five lived in a small Gasaillon or housing project named Via Kennedy.

Jac Kennedy was and is one of the many housing projects throughout someone.

The Gasadiels tended to be heavily policed and subject to prejudice.

Still, Ramon Junior's family managed to get by, but that doesn't mean they avoided all the pitfalls of poverty.

At Ramond Senior struggled with addiction all throughout his son's childhood, turning to alcohol as well as illegal drugs.

Eventually he would get clean, but his addiction would leave a significant impact on his son's life. An addiction wasn't the only way the shadow of poverty would darken Ramond Junior's child.

Ramond Junior was a lover of the great American pastime baseball. As early as the age of six, he dreamt of playing for who else, the New York Yankees.

He was just a peewee ball player in the middle of a game when suddenly a gunman strode from the stands to the home plate and shot Ramond's coach point blank.

Reflecting on this experience as an adult, daddy, Yankee would say, I went to his burial and seeing him right there, I couldn't sleep. Back in those days, a manager or coach for a kid represents a role model, and you don't understand what really happened until you get to a certain age.

Nonetheless, Ramon Junior continued to find joy and escape through baseball. More and more. He would show immense talent as a third baseman.

And all the while he also showed he had a knack for music. When the family went caroling during the holidays, he would make up rhymes on the spot just for fun, which would probably they earned most Latino kids a strung pinch on the back on the arm from Abuela So I guess Yankee was lucky in some ways.

Not surprisingly as a teenager, his natural talent for music and improvisation would lead to his next great love rap.

Around the age of fourteen, Ramon fell in love with now Classic Queen's hip hop group Run DMC Run DMC.

Michael Jackson. Obviously dadd Yankee spent his weekday afternoons glued to MTV. He's one of all us.

But perhaps most importantly, Ramond Junior's biggest hip hop influence was one of Puerto Rico's own, Vico C. Born in Brooklyn and raised just ten miles from Daddy Yankee's barrion, San Juan, Vico C inspired a whole generation of Puerto Rican rappers.

Before vicoc rap in Espanol wasn't really a thing in Puerto Rico. Vico C made home recordings straight to storebock cassette tapes and distributed him himself.

Original mixtape Call It Right. Like the original mixtape Now When young Puerto Ricans like Ramond Junior heard Vigo see, it was a revelation. He showed them what they were capable of, and from there young DJs and empces spread like wildfire.

Often the emceeeds would rhyme over beats reminiscent of hip hop from New York. By the nineties, the Brooklyn's boombob sound.

Was a very on trend, which is to say that from early on, Puerto Rican's relationship with New Aricans and other Latinos in the northeastern US is a key part of the story. But remember, La Isla had beats of its own.

By the time Daddy Yankee was wrapping, reggae Espanol had evolved throughout the eighties and was beginning to sound like what we now call reggaeton thanks to the iconic dem bo rhythm.

The youth of poor barrios like Ramond Juniors couldn't get enough of it. But the authorities, well, they had some other feelings.

Much like dancehall and Panama, Puerto Rican reggaeton and rap Espanol was quickly marginalized and heavily policed, and in the nineties, the police in Puerto Rico were super militarized.

Oh yeah, they conducted raids on music stores and confiscated reggaeton cassette tapes. With the backing of laws against obscenity, rapperos like Daddy Yankee were subject to fines and vilified on local TV and radio.

But this didn't stop youth culture from doing its thing. That Raperos just took the culture further underground, recording music in garages with minimal equipment and selling music out of the trunks of cars.

And even with Los Federals breathing down their necks, there was one place young regaton fans could gather, a now legendary club called The Noise.

Located in La Perla, the poorest neighborhood in San Juan. The Noise was founded by DJ Negro, the producer who worked with Daddy Yankee's favorite Raperro Vicosi. See guys, It's all connected.

It's all all connected. It's here at the Noise where Daddy Yankee, at sixteen, gets on stage and begins to make a name for himself, along with other pioneering reggaeton netos like Deego Calleron We see Nyandell and Spoiler Future front of me Nikki jam Jeoze.

But every rapper needs a producer, and Daddy Yankee's man behind the deck was one DJ Plaeto.

DJ Plato began releasing mixtapes of original beats that range from the boom up of the nineties Brooklyn to upbeat reggaeton of his own scene.

These tapes also feature local rappers, and the standout was the teenage Daddy Yankee.

If you guys have not taken a moment down music history lane, go back to this song right. This is called so fer Sigemn not de thingas and this truly is the first Daddy Yankee as we know him song. What did you think when you first heard it? And does it sound like today is regeton? Or does it sound like old people's ragaton.

Not the old people's rageton? You know what, I'm not going to be able to tell you honestly what the first thing I heard? I naturally started moving my hips and gyrating in my seat, so like I just wanted to dance. You know. It kind of gave me this like Afrikaans dance, Like I just kind of wanted to like shake my body. So I wasn't necessarily listening, I could just feel the beat.

Now, let's talk about what Daddy Yankee's actually saying in this song, because for reference, you guys, you might hear the song and think that he sounds like a mature man. Like you hear the song, you're like, oh, he's like in his twenties, or he's like twenty two or twenty four thirty. But Joseph, did you know that this is a teenage Daddy Yankee. He is fifteen years old rapping on this song.

This is little Sun Yankee. Oh my god, he's fifteen? Wait is it is? That's not illegal? Right? Like fifteen? I don't know. How can you work? You can't do some You could do a whole bunch of shit.

I'll tell you that these nineties kids, the people that are born in the eighties and nineties are wild. You and I are a testament. We were left at home alone. We were making our own Wow, we were making our own TV dinners. We were rapping on albums like come On. Children of the eighties and nineties are wild. But yes, Daddy Yankee was only fifteen years old when he recorded this song. But you can already hear how advanced he is lyrically, you could already hear the style that would

Okay, But you know what, I'm going to tell you something with that. It's just funny because it doesn't mean that people said that before. Because I said the word shut your butt a long, long time ago, and all of a sudden, someone of the Kardashians, they said, shut your butt, And I'm just I'm using that as a phrase. But Chloe said, shut your butt. I been saying shut your butt for a very long time. In this recent season, she said shut your butt. So people say other words

Know if he was the first person or the guy that invented the phrase reggaeton, But previous to this, people were calling it reggae and espanol, which is a little cumbersome, like it doesn't quite roll off the tongue the same way that reggaeton does. So thank you Daddy Yankee for putting it in a song and for changing the title, because we don't need to be saying reggae and espanol

And for as much attention as he was getting in the underground as a RAPPERO Ramon was also getting a reputation as a star athlete. Soon after Pa and Ta Cuadro dropped, Ramon was about to receive the opportunity of a lifetime Liliana.

That's so formal. Why are you being so formal?

Right? Now are you there? Okay, listen, I have to ask you something. What have you ever experienced a blessing in disguise?

Oh my god?

Yes, of course, like someone who's like shut the door on you and then it turns into something else. Yes.

When I had just moved to Philadelphia, I auditioned to be a host on QBC stop. Yes I did, Yes, I did. And I went for weeks. It was rounds and rounds of interviews and auditions and live selling and training and fittings. And I got to the last round and I didn't get it. Wow, And I got the news. I was leaving the doctor's office. I was in a hallway about to get on an elevator, and I broke down in tears. I was like, my life on television is over. I will never be on TV. I will NET,

Another one opens, right, Yeah, if not, you just go in through the window. That's what I did.

And that's kind of what's about to happen to Daddy Yankee, because in nineteen ninety four, Ramond drew the attention of a scout from the Seattle Mariners. At the age of seventeen, he was on the verge of signing a contract to join the team's third baseman.

Everyone who had seen him play knew that he was going places, and his dream of joining the major leagues was about to become a reality.

Still, he continues to record with Playerro. One day, the two get together to work on a new mixtape in Dramond's neighborhood via Kennedy. It's January sixth, which is Three Kings Day for all of you non practicing Catholics.

So Ramond decides to take a break and heads outside. He greets his neighbors and it seems like any other afternoon.

When suddenly, gunshots split the air. Dramond sees bullets flying in opposite directions. Violence has erupted on his street. He sprints, desperate to get himself out of the crossfire. He's running, running, running as fast as he can, and in an instant, his leg crumbles underneath him.

He's been hit by a stray bullet, which ends up being lodged in his hip. He stumbles to the ground and crawls underneath a parked van. To this day, he says the shelter of the van is the one thing that kept him alive amid the shooting.

After the gunfire ceases, but Ramons hospitalized and it takes him over a year to recover from his injury. Over a year spent in a wheelchair and on crutches, steadily regaining his string, but he never fully regains his mobility, meaning he'll never dawn.

An MLB uniform Lying in the hospital at Ramon fixates on his dash dreams. He had proven that he had what it takes. Everyone had been rooting for him, and his big chance was gone in an instant.

Today, Daddy Yankee says he thanks God for that bullet. It remains lodged in his hip. Doctors have determined that it would be riskier to remove it than to leave it be. A metal pres thesis in his leg helps him walk, but his mobility has been limited since that fateful day.

His dreams of playing the major leagues had slipped through his fingers, but in the years that followed he would find a new dream and grab on with both hands.

Shortly after Ramon's recovery, he became a father. At nineteen, he married his high school sweetheart, Mireds Gonzalez, with whom he remains married to until this.

Day, oh Wow, And upon the birth of his first daughter, yami Let, Ramon decided to put all of his focus on what he was good at, rapping.

After years of mixtapes, he again got together with DJ Plaiero and put out a proper debut album in nineteen ninety five called No Mercy.

The name of the cover simply reads a yank. At the time, Ramon went by names like Winchester Trentai Trienta and winchesta Yankee.

The album features a couple of old school sounding rap tracks with boombab beats, but the overwhelmingly majority of the tracks are classic dance hall style reggaeton.

After Ramon's injury, the album was an opening sobo for his commitment to music. Reggaton was quickly becoming the prevailing sound of the Sanjuan underground and Young Yankee and DJ Plaiero were staking their claim.

And soon they would find themselves making noise outside of Puerto Rico.

Ramon hustled selling cassette copies of No Mercy, just like his hero Vicosi had done. The buzz grew bigger and bigger, but he wasn't the only one hustling. In fact, a few key members of this scene were working to make ripples beyond the island.

The same year, Daddy Yankee dropped his debut, formative Puerto Rican reggaton producer Nico Canada teamed up with New York's Tony Touch for nineteen ninety five's Watauba.

It was a mixtape featuring Puerto Rican drapertos like Daddy Yankee, Alberto Style, and don Cezina, as well as New York rappers like Matt Lyon and Karas One.

On a single disc, Reggaeton and nineties Boom Bob stood shoulder to shoulder. These were the most cutting edge sounds coming out of two different underground scenes that were more than fifteen hundred miles apart. He had somehow still connected because of the love between Neu Urrikans and their motherland.

But for Daddy Yankee, wa would prove to be a warm up. Nineteen ninety seven's Bodicua Guerreno First Combat would up the antie with two full discs, one boombab one.

Regaton Nkokanada linked up with DJ Playerro Yankee's longtime collaborator, and the pair spent two months in a hotel room in New York City for yet another crossover between Puerto Rico's top reggazoneros and New York's best and brightest.

MCS Mexicano seven seven seven Eddie d Daddy Yankee Busta Rhymes, Q tip that Joe was even there.

Everybody was there, but the biggest name of the bunch, the one that you're like gonna be like wit what he was there?

Who Nas what?

Uh huh? Nas was hot off the success of his nineteen ninety four debut Illmatic. His nineteen ninety six follow up, It Was Written, had sold a quarter of a million copies.

Where hip hop was concerned, Nas was the artist to watch, and on Brigua Guerrero he split a track with Daddy Yankee titled The Prophecy.

Yankee intros the track with a classic dancehall affect, wrapping the island and shouting out Knos, who shouts him back from New York, saying, Puerto Rico, we roll.

In with you. NAS's verse is a hip hop anthem about surviving and thriving. He uses gangster vibes to show how he overcomes tough times and ends up on top of La Pablo escomar.

But Yankeees verse turns that gangster imagery on his head. He calls out those who aspire to live large, only to be done in by their own deeds. He quotes his mother, your.

Future depends on the sowing of your works. He continues, Live by the sword, Die by the sword. Another wordrds, make no enemies, trust no bitch, and I am not looking to make enemies with him. On Brigua Guerrero. It just gives me this dark and over policed sound, like I feel like this was definitely He's coming for you.

You know what's fuddy is? I do think in my head there is a sound to Daddy Yankee. So when we were researching this episode and we're listening to some of these older discs, I don't associate that sound with him, right, It's really different, Like I know it pops up here and there but for the most part, like you like to always say, Regaeton is like music you can shake your ass too. I mean, I'm sure you could shake your ass to this song.

But it'd be a little different, right, you know, It's funny hearing Daddy Yankee like, I mean, yes, it's kind of similar. But like if I heard this first from Daddy Yankee, I would be like, whoa, this is kind of from a dark place. Like I wouldn't associate this with the ass shaking Daddy Yankee. If you heard this first, like I would be like, oh, I'm not going to listen to his music. That's just not my vibe. So it's cool that he dabbled with this, but it's just very, very different.

It is different, and I think it just shows you his range, right, and I think the entire project, I think what's so special about this, and we talk about this all the time, is that there is such a connection between Puerto Rico and New York City, right specifically like the Bronx, they just share so much. And obviously they share an island, but they share music, they share culture,

Then, on the second disc, Di and Nicocanada brought their reggaeton a game from start to finish, introducing New York's underground to the sound of Puerto.

Ricos, and Daddy Yankee is there on both discs, first going toe to toe with hip hop's biggest rising star before showing how it's done down in the Tropics.

This was crucial to Daddy Yankee's success and to the coming success of reggaeton as a whole. From Jamaica to Kanama, to Puerto Rico to New York and back again. It was clear that reggaeton wasn't a fact, but a part of something deeper.

And by helping establish the genre's credibility in New York, Daddy Yankee had all but set the stage for himself to dominate but stardom.

Kintestovitch, for example, could Daddy Yankee really make no enemies.

On the next Becoming an Icon Daddy Yankees rise from the underground to the top. Becoming an Icon is presented by Sonoo and Iheart's Michael Duda podcast Network. Listen to Becoming an Icon on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast