All was going smoothly until a surprise guest appeared on stage with an acoustic guitar in hand.
Bad Bunny’s 2023 Coachella headline show on Friday night was an epic show. The Puerto Rican superstar was the first Latino solo artist to headline the music festival, and he broke the barrier with a commanding charisma and heartfelt respect for the music that created him.
During Friday night’s set, the artist appeared in a line of colorful plates backed by elaborate stage designs — at first appearing like a gas station in the desert, the artist addressed the mammoth crowd from his altar on a suspended platform.
The set opened with his 2022 arrest single “Titty Me Pregundo” and included global favorites such as “I Like It” (sans Cardi B and J Balvin) and “See You A Tu Mama,” a remix of the immortal “The Girl.” ran From Ipanema” to a new generation.
Speaking between songs in Spanish — early on, he asked the crowd which language they preferred, the results were clear — how Bad Bunny confidently explained to the thousands, “Nunca antes hubo uno como yo,” or: “There’s never been one like me.”
Bad Buddy took Coachella’s main stage to honor the music history that inspired him, using short documentary interludes that appeared on the screen during show transitions.
Starting with a tribute to the origins of drums and rhythm from the Congo and Nigeria to the history of salsa and reggaeton (with a nod to the great Tito Puente), his set paid homage to the multitude of artists and musical styles that converged to inform his opening headline. Act for the festival.
The only setback came at the end when he decided to share the stage with a previous Coachella headliner.
Post Malone performs in the Sahara Tent at the 2022 Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival on April 16, 2022 in Indio, California.
Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for CoachellaAs Bad Bunny made his way through the crowd, a mysterious figure appeared at the side of the stage. Until Bad Bunny returned to the spotlight, the cameras revealed a surprise guest: Post Malone.
Shockwaves of excitement (and ambiguity) echoed around the back of the polo field, and the two artists brought the tempo down for a somber duet, with Post Malone strumming the guitar.
They started singing Bad Bunny’s “La Cancione,” and within the first minute, Post Malone’s guitar began to strum and staccato. At first, the tattooed-faced artist appeared to be deliberately creating a rhythmic change in the song, but within seconds, it became clear that the microphone amplifying his guitar had failed.
Embarrassed, the two artists scrambled to fix the sound problems. The guitar tried to grab a solo microphone while Bad Bunny sang with another microphone, but his plan B quickly failed. The crowd helped out with an a cappella version of “Yonakuni,” but the act quickly lost steam.
Post Malone — who’s known for drawing suspicious eyes from locals when he visits the festival’s host city, Indio — quickly exits the stage and leaves Bad Bunny, finishing his set without any technical issues.
Fireworks exploded in the sky as Bad Bunny recovered from a snafu to close the first night of Coachella 2023.
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