Even without releasing an album, he is the most listened to singer of the year on Spotify

Singer Bad Bunny is Spotify's most listened to artist for the second year in a row, however one detail stands out: he didn't release any album this year. With its strategy focused on releasing singles in 2021, without a last album “The Last Tour of the World”which has 16 tracks, was released in 2020. Bad Bunny's prominence reflects the reality of current music consumption on a global scale.

^{Bad Bunny won the award for “Favorite Artist of the Year” at the 2021 AMAs. (Photo: Amy Sussman/Getty Images)}

If, on the one hand, the eyes of the music industry have increasingly turned to billion-dollar deals in Music Catalogs, the tactic of releasing singles also remains on the rise. Analyzing the case of Bad Bunny, the singer has more than 43 million monthly listeners on Spotify and more than 40 million followers on the platform. The main cities that listen to the singer are: Mexico City (Mexico), Santiago (Chile), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Madrid (Spain) and Lima (Peru).

For digital platforms like Spotify, the release of singles is widely used to maintain the regularity of the algorithm and possible entries into the famous Editorial Playlists, and Bad Bunny seems to follow the best practices to maintain its popularity. Accessing his profile on Spotify, the artist released 7 singles this year, the latest being the track “Lo Siento BB:/”in partnership with Tainy and Julieta Venegas, which debuted in October this year and has already accumulated a significant 144 million streams.

However, for lovers of music catalogs and albums, Bad Bunny's prominence does not mean that albums are no longer produced or that they are “not valued in the digital age”. For singer Adele, for example, the creative process of an album must be maintained to the point that she asked Spotify to remove the “random play” feature and the platform complied with her request. In fact, the album “30” by Adele had this year's best album debut.

Through understanding each artist's target audience and their objective with the artistic work, there is no exact formula for the “best musical strategy”. The music industry of 2021 has pointed out different paths and in the case of Bad Bunny, with the release of singles that are on average 3 minutes each. These singles are capable of bringing an idea about a certain musical genre and artist, but still, they are not a rule.

Featured Photo: Singer Bad Bunny at this year's AMAs. Reproduction/Amy Sussman/Getty Images.