Thanks to my weekend’s travels in Copenhagen, I am now all too familiar with Justin Bieber’s latest single, Despacito. I probably know the lyrics word for word, and can even tell you what the Spanish meanings are behind the song. Biebs, however, clearly does not.
During a performance in New York, Justin Bieber opened with his latest track with Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee, but about half way through he forgot the lyrics. Instead, he proceeded to sing ‘blah blah blah blah.’ Don’t get us wrong, we’ve all been there, forgetting lyrics is nothing new and with the pace most artists sing at it’s pretty much impossible to keep up, but Justin – we have a bone to pick with you.
You have decided to expand your music, you have decided to sing, in Spanish - the second most-spoken language in the world, after Chinese, with around 400 million speakers. You’ve taken a track originally sung by Puerto Rican pop artist Luis Fonsi, and expanded Spanish culture to the masses – which is great, don’t get us wrong. But you have also decided not to learn the words, which is, quite frankly, really ignorant.
Albert Granada, 26, from Galicia, Spain told us that he ‘prefered the original but the Justin Bieber track was useful for expanding Latin culture all over the world.’ When asked if he thought it was offensive he said he did find it offensive, but that he didn’t expect anything else from Bieber.
You’re not the first pop-star to give singing in Spanish a go – Latin native Jennifer Lopez has released track after track in Spanish and more recently she premiered a new song from her upcoming Spanish album, Mirate, at the 2017 Billboard Latin Music Awards. The Spice Girls even released 2 Become 1 as a Spanish version, called Seremos Uno Los Dos, in 1996. But both J Lo, who is of Latin decent, and The Spice Girls did something you did not. They learned the lyrics, word for word. They probably practised them countless times so that when performing they didn’t insult a culture that is so widely celebrated across the world. And instead you sang ‘blah blah blah.’ It’s just not good enough, is it Biebs?
Watch Justin forget those lyrics here:
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.