Rosalía, Bad Bunny, and “Summer Flings”
The song “La Noche de Anoche” by Rosalía and Bad Bunny is so seductively haunting. It embodies the paradox of a fiery connection that is both ephemeral, and everlasting in your heart.
Lyric Sample:
Porque la noche de anoche fue (-ue)
Algo que yo no puedo explicar
Sola, dando y dándole sin parar (-rar)
Tú me decías que morías por mí
English Translation:
Because the night of last night
Was something I could not explain
We did it non stop
You told me that you were dying for me
Go here for the full English translation.
It makes me want to take a day off to escape into whatever fantasy realm in which they are existing. But just a day.
It captures such important feelings and also an important message, whether or not they are cognizant of sending it (I’m sure the artists are, but the people they are portraying may not be).
This song is about lovers experiencing an overwhelming level of passion that can only be felt free from commitment. They can leave it all on the dancefloor, or elsewhere, without thinking of how this will play out long term. In this context you can keep on “giving and giving without stopping” (dando y dándole sin parar).
The experiences and sentiments described in this song can be a sensual suspension of other roles within a committed foundation, but they are not THE foundation.
They are saying that they cannot continue with each other, and I’m inclined to believe them.
I have worked with a handful of couples that I suspect had this type of foundation and little else to their relationship. The passion is intriguing and I can see how desperately they want things to work out. But when you explore for more beyond the passion and fantasy realm, there is not much else. They find themselves either unable or unwilling to do the work needed to stay together. They are left with the heartache of losing all they tried to invest.
The moral of this story is that you don’t have to stay with someone just because there is passion. If you look around (the metaphorical) next morning and find there is little else, you can sing your beautiful goodbye song and move on. This person can still mean something to you, and in fact their memory stays vibrant and inspiring within the confines of a shorter attachment rather than demolishing that special energy by dragging it out.
Bad Bunny and Rosalía met in 2019 at Coachella, and wanted to collaborate on a song for a while. They nailed it. Both as artists and adults they are at a stage where they have enough wisdom to know when something works and when it doesn’t. Underneath the passion, this is a song about conscientious insight and decisions. I love the solemn respect with which Rosalía sings “I know I would be your weakness” (Sé que sería tu debilidad).
Some of the most inspiring love stories must stay contained in some fleeting moments, and that’s okay. You’ll always have Paris, you’ll always have this song.
