A photo of Lois and Clark surrounded by photos of hands at a typewriter, tortoise shell glasses, and Superman stamps.

The Washington Post

lois and clark 

FILE: Joe Jonas Reportedly Retains Divorce Lawyer 2023 Vanity Fair Oscar Party Hosted By Radhika Jones - Arrivals

Staff

TALK TO ME

studio

handout

Photo illustration of three phones being held at an angle with a still of the movie "Sound of Freedom," photo of three Harmon brothers behind a blue background with a white light above them, and photo of the actor playing Jesus in CW's The Chosen

Getty

Tiffany Haddish 

They Cloned Tyrone

American actress Gabrielle Union photographed in Miami Beach, Fl. by Jeffery Salter for the Washington Post.

Photographer

Photo illustration of reality tv star Taylor Hale

The support system among Black reality TV stars who make history


Diverse Writers And Actors Support WGA Strike

Stringer

Angela Bassett


ELVIS

other

Robert Townsend

Jessie Buckley

WHITE NOISE

Respond to prefers-color-scheme dark in app web views

Follow section front redirects in Spectrum

Enable NLP source in PCS for load testing

Switch off the News Alerts Survey Widget when we have enough responses

Poll to determine if new LUF updates are available

Allows the winning A/B test variant to be turned on without Spectrum deployment

Show expanded byline information on articles

Show infinite scrolling sections in Assembler MultiView

Show option for NLP article summaries in Action Bar

Show NLP summaries collection recirc on article pages

A general feature flag for Recipe Features that aren't yet released

Feature flag for media team features that aren't yet released

Use new Orca video player for preroll plugin in Spectrum

Show the snow tracker (instead of the heat tracker) on Spectrum

I was homeless as a kid. Here’s how I survived. 

A teen dropped out of high school during WWII. Now 99, she just graduated.

Kittens or puppies? Animals left at shelter turned out to be foxes — again.

Kabosu, side-eyeing Shiba inu who inspired the ‘doge’ meme, dies at 18

Boeing continues to struggle with spacecraft problems ahead of human flight

Why Google’s AI might recommend you mix glue into your pizza

Baseball’s next great disrupter might be this Japanese pitching savant

Four years later, has the racial-justice movement lost the fight?

In Milwaukee public housing, a padlocked patio becomes a battleground

Carolyn Hax: Parent pushes son not to exclude abusive mom from his wedding

Ask Amy: Widower finds new love with a married neighbor

Miss Manners: How do I know if something is a gift?

Progressive Democrats aren’t turning activism into election wins

U.S. and allies move to tap frozen Russian funds despite Kremlin threats

More voters are identifying as Republicans. That could bode ill for Democrats in November.

Israel denies claim that Hamas captured IDF soldiers in northern Gaza

These Ukrainians were musicians before the war. Now they fight with song.

U.S. silent as global condemnation of Israel’s Rafah offensive grows  

Trevor Williams keeps dealing as Nationals shut down Mariners again

Nationals loosen up and ride MacKenzie Gore to a win over the Mariners

The Nats’ offense is floundering. There are a few reasons.

 How Florida is getting its pink back

Scarlett Johansson vs. Sky: Can you hear the difference?

Here’s who The Post endorses in D.C. Council primary elections

How (not) to fix the border

The Trump hush money trial shows how far the GOP has fallen

A year after paying off our 2.75% mortgage, we still have no regrets

Home-insurance payouts are shrinking. Here’s how to prevent the worst.

Maxed out on your credit card? Here’s how to dig out.

Budget airlines are dropping notorious fees. What changed?

American Airlines fires lawyers after blaming child for being filmed in bathroom

Want to find hidden gem restaurants? Follow the business crowd to lunch. 

Sarah Yenesel

By all accounts, 2023 was shaping up to be a rough year for Shakira. She and her longtime partner, Spanish footballer Gerard Piqué, were in the midst of a very public split, and the pop superstar had also been ordered to stand trial for <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2022/09/27/shakira-trial-tax-fraud-spain/" target=_blank>alleged tax fraud</a> in Spain.

But less than two weeks into the new year, Shakira came out swinging on a record-breaking collaboration — with in-demand Argentine DJ-producer Bizarrap — that set the now-46-year-old singer on a path to have one of the best years of her career. One highlight unfolded Tuesday at MTV’s annual Video Music Awards, where the Colombia native performed and received the lifetime achievement award.

There was nothing subtle about “Shakira: Bzrp Music Sessions, Vol. 53,” which referenced Piqué’s new, then-23-year-old girlfriend by name and addresses her ex directly: “You left me with a mother-in-law as my neighbor, with the press at my door and in debt with the estate.”

SHAKIRA || BZRP Music Sessions #53

For any other pop star, releasing an effective diss track, alongside a producer known for working mainly with reggaeton and Latin trap stars, might be seen as a risky move. But for Shakira, whose work has been defined by global, genre-defying music and pointed lyrics, it was (savvy) business as usual.

Shakira rose to fame as a teenager in Colombia, where she recorded her first album, “Magia,” at just 13. She reached commercial success with her third and fourth efforts — “Pies Descalzos” (“Bare Feet”) and “Dónde Están los Ladrones?” (“Where are the Thieves?”) — establishing her reputation as a gifted songwriter and “rockera” whose vocals <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-apr-18-ca-28445-story.html" target=_blank>earned comparisons to Alanis Morissette’s</a>. “Pies Descalzos,” released in 1995, featured songs such as the lovesick “Antologia” (“Anthology”) and “Se Quiere, Se Mata,” which tells the story of a teenage girl who dies from an <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/abortion/" target="_blank" class="contextual_link">abortion</a> she has in secret.

The album put Shakira on the radar of music executive Emilio Estefan, who had overseen the very successful English-language crossover of his wife, Gloria Estefan, and other Latin music stars, and saw similar crossover potential in the “Pies Descalzos” singer.

With Estefan on board as her manager and executive producer, Shakira recorded “Dónde Están los Ladrones?” The 1998 album echoed the thoughtful songwriting of “Pies Descalzos,” while leaning more heavily into rock en español. On “Octavo Día” (“Eighth Day”), Shakira sings about God taking a day off after creating the world, only to <a href="https://www.mtv.com/news/3vp4o0/shakira-calls-for-peace-explains-mongoose-mystery" target=_blank>find his creation in turmoil</a> when he returns; “Inevitable” finds the singer confessing to a past love: “I can’t find a way to forget you / because to keep loving you is inevitable.”

“Dónde” landed on the Billboard 200 chart and earned the backing of then-Sony Music chief Tommy Mottola, who <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-apr-18-ca-28407-story.html" target=_blank>told the Los Angeles Times</a> that Shakira was “absolutely brilliant as an artist.” The 1999 article also quoted Mottola’s prescient prediction that “Latin music is the reservoir of talent that can be the crossover pop stars and the global pop stars of the future.”

If “Pies Descalzos” and “Dónde” made Shakira a household name in Latin America (and Latin communities in the United States), it was the bilingual “Laundry Service,” released in 2001, that established Shakira as a force in global pop. The following year, she took the VMAs stage for the first time, performing a belly-dancing rendition of “Objection (Tango),” the album’s fourth single and one of several tracks — including “Whenever, Wherever” — that appeared in both English and Spanish. “Ojos Así,” also translated into both languages, offers a nod to Shakira’s Lebanese heritage and features several verses in Arabic. “Laundry Service” peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 and led to the singer’s first hits — “Underneath Your Clothes,” “Objection (Tango) and “Whenever, Wherever” — on the Hot 100.

Like the Grammys — where “Laundry Service” <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/entertainment/grammys-should-have-won/" target=_blank>failed to land an album of the year nomination</a>, despite its popularity — the VMAs have struggled in the past to recognize the global popularity of Latin music, particularly when that music is primarily in Spanish. (“Despacito” was <a href="https://www.billboard.com/music/latin/despacito-vma-snub-media-latin-blind-spot-7934291/" target=_blank>notoriously snubbed at the 2017 ceremony</a>, despite its status as the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/whats-next-for-latin-music-after-the-summer-of-despacito/2017/08/24/703ba7de-8816-11e7-961d-2f373b3977ee_story.html" target=_blank>song of the summer</a><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/whats-next-for-latin-music-after-the-summer-of-despacito/2017/08/24/703ba7de-8816-11e7-961d-2f373b3977ee_story.html" target=_blank> </a>— and beyond — that year.) That has started to change in recent years, as the VMAs have hosted sets from reggaeton stars including Maluma, Ozuna (who <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EDbDtVcmYA" target=_blank>performed alongside Catalan pop superstar Rosalía</a> in 2019) and Bad Bunny, who performed with his “Oasis” collaborator, J Balvin, at the same ceremony.

Shakira has undoubtedly been a driving force on the journey from the ’90s-era Latin crossover that brought the likes of Gloria Estefan and Ricky Martin to fame beyond Latin America (but with largely English-language catalogues) to the new generation of Latin stars who perform exclusively in Spanish. Shakira continued to fuse English and Spanish on subsequent albums, and she was the first VMAs act to perform entirely in Spanish, with “La Tortura” — a reggaeton-inflected duet featuring Alejandro Sanz — from her 2005 album “Fijación Oral, Vol. 1.” (A companion album, “Oral Fixation, Vol. 2,” featured English-language tracks).

Shakira, Rauw Alejandro - Te Felicito (Official Video)

Though not all of her fans appreciated her genre-hopping, Shakira’s career has benefited from her early embrace of reggaeton, the once-underground genre that now dominates the global pop landscape. Before teaming up with Bizarrap, Shakira logged collabs with other reggaetoneros, including <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szTD2QktmmE" target=_blank>Calle 13 rapper Residente</a>, Ozuna and Rauw Alejandro. “Chantaje,” her 2016 duet with Maluma, is one of her most popular songs on YouTube — second only to “Waka Waka (“This Time For Africa”),” which served as the official World Cup song in 2010 (“Hips Don’t Lie,” the Wyclef Jean duet that landed Shakira’s first Billboard Hot 100 hit is her third most-viewed video on the platform). When she and J. Lo co-headlined the 2020 Super Bowl halftime show, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2020/02/04/shakira-jennifer-lopezs-super-bowl-halftime-show-wasnt-inappropriate-it-was-latino-party-its-finest/" target=_blank>Bad Bunny and J Balvin joined the pop stars</a> for a portion of their set.

Julie Yoon

This year’s VMAs telecast marked a full-circle moment for Shakira. She was the first South American artist to receive the Video Vanguard Award, a milestone that arrived as the VMAs — which were <a href="https://corporate.televisaunivision.com/press/2023/09/11/mtv-and-televisaunivision-unite-for-first-of-its-kind-partnership-for-vmas-simulcast-on-tuesday-september-12th/" target=_blank>simulcast on Univision</a> — were more global than ever. Brazilian singer Anitta and Karol G, the fellow Colombian singer who teamed up with Shakira for the post-breakup power anthem “TQG,” performed — as did Peso Pluma, a best new artist nominee whose collaborations straddling regional Mexican and reggaeton have <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2023/06/02/regional-mexican-music-peso-pluma/" target=_blank>earned him growing international fame</a>.

“I might consider myself debris from the Latin explosion,” Shakira <a href="https://www.billboard.com/music/latin/shakira-maluma-interview-billboard-cover-story-2018-8347120/" target=_blank>told Billboard in 2018</a>, adding: “It’s hard to generalize, but music is at a point where it increasingly has a more sophisticated sound that’s attractive to a global fan. Many Latin artists understand this universality well, and they know how to attract global tastes.”

The Bzrp collab that kicked off Shakira’s big year<a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-latin/shakira-broke-14-guinness-world-records-1234694771/" target="_blank"> broke a slew of records</a> — including the best debut for a Spanish-language song on Spotify and the <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2023/3/shakira-and-bizarrap-make-history-as-bzrp-music-sessions-vol-53-bags-string-of-records" target="_blank">fastest Latin track to reach 100 million views</a> on YouTube. It also made Shakira the first woman to land in the Top 10 of Billboard’s Hot 100 for a Spanish-language track.

Shakira offers a nod to her vast music catalogue in the song, as she howls “una loba como yo no está pa’ tipos como tu” — “a she-wolf like me isn’t for guys like you” — in a callback to the lead single from her 2009 album of the same name.

“Las mujeres ya no lloran / las mujeres facturan,” Shakira adds against an electro-pop beat, offering advice she has seemingly followed herself. Essentially: Women don’t cry anymore / they cash in!

University of Maryland, BA in journalism

Bethonie Butler writes about television and pop culture for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2010 as a member of the social media team.

Bethonie Butler

washpost

Shakira, MTV Video Vanguard Award winner, has always been ahead of her time

the-washington-post

MTV Video Music Awards, Newark, USA - 12 Sep 2023

EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Arts & Entertainments

Power

The Media

Fashion

Of Interest

Style

Style - The Washington Post

Style is the source for breaking news and trending topics on fashion, culture, and anything of interest. You’ll find in-depth coverage of the media and entertainment including the latest in movies, music and tv.

prism://prism.query/site,/entertainment&limit=20

The latest news on entertainments and arts from The Washington Post. Breaking news and in-depth coverage of movies, music, tv, art, theater and video games.

prism://prism.query/ap-articles-by-site-id,/entertainment&limit=3

prism://prism.query/arts-music-feed/&limit=20

Music

Music - The Washington Post

Coverage of music from The Washington Post. The latest headlines, breaking news, in-depth coverage and reviews of music.