Anonymous
If you’ve listened to the radio or gone to a club in the past year, chances are that you’ve heard Mi Gente¸ the hit song by J. Balvin and Willy Williams. The original version of this Latin hit peaked at No. 19 on the Billboard Hot 100, and the combined chart entries for its remix featuring Beyoncé surpassed it by reaching No.3. Mi Gente has become a symbol of pride and unity for the Latin community, especially after Beyoncé announced that the proceeds from her remix would be donated to relief efforts in Mexico, the Caribbean, and Puerto Rico following the hurricanes in mid-2017. The title translates to “My People,” which underscores its message of solidarity among Spanish-speaking communities around the world. Despite its strong ties to Spanish, the song also includes lyrics in French and English.
What originally drew me to this song were the French lyrics sprinkled throughout it. Co-writer Willy William is a French DJ, and he provides the lines “mais fais bouger la tête” and “c’est comme ci, c’est comme ça, ma chérie.” The first contribution hints at the fact that the original version of this song isn’t completely original. The line is taken directly from Voodoo Song, which Williams had released earlier in 2017. Mi Gente also borrowed Voodoo Song’s background hook. Since Williams collaborated with Colombian artist J. Balvin to create the Spanish sensation, it’s no surprise that he’d lend his previous creative works to the project. However, that catchy hook wasn’t even Williams’ to donate; it wasn’t completely his original work.
The hook itself is a slowed-down, embellished version of a sample from a Bengali/Bangladeshi song called Heila Duila Nach by artists Akassh and Bidya Sinha Saha Mim. Even to the untrained ear, listening to a short section of each of the three songs demonstrates that they all share their signature sound. Heila Duila Nach was released in December of 2016, and Voodoo Song came out in May of 2017, so it’s highly unlikely that the sampling went the other way around. Interestingly, when asked about the creation of the hook, Williams has answered, “I don’t know if it’s a secret, how I made this hook, it’s a mix of vocal, flute and sax,” and that he “made [the] track in two hours.” In neither of those interviews did he ever reference Heila Duila Nach, and neither he nor J. Balvin ever mentioned the Bangladeshi song in any of their interviews that I have found. While I’m sure Williams and Balvin have followed any copyright procedures regarding sampling other songs, I am surprised that neither artist has made the track’s source more widely known. The message of Mi Gente is all about embracing cultural differences and celebrating our similarities, but it seems odd that a song so entrenched in collaboration is so lacking in recognition of its sources.
Despite any potential foul play on Williams and Balvin’s part, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed listening to and analyzing all three pieces (or four, if you count the Beyoncé remix), and found they have a lot in common. A core theme of all three songs is dancing and letting yourself be free. The words “heila duila nach” translate to “move and dance,” and another line in the song, “tension fension cha,” means “shake the stress out.” In Voodoo Song, Williams tells his listeners, “ne retiens pas ton corps, il veut danser,” which means “don’t hold back your body, it wants to dance.” Williams tells listeners of both Voodoo Song and Mi Gente “fais bouger la tête,” or “move your head,” while Balvin proclaims “Toda mi gente se mueve, mira el ritmo cómo los tiene,” or “All of my people are moving, look how the rhythm has them!” Each artist created their song to encourage their listeners to move their bodies and shake away their troubles.
Another core piece of Mi Gente’s message is embodied by Balvin’s line, “Mi música no discrimina a nadie,” or “my music doesn’t discriminate against anyone.” Based on the overwhelmingly positive worldwide reception of the song, Balvin seems to have gotten his message across. Even in the US, a country that typically has been reluctant to listen to songs that aren’t in English, the song gained widespread popularity. The only word in English in the original version is “freeze,” and the rest is in Spanish with the few French exceptions. Perhaps this small instance of code-switching to English was enough to make it more enjoyable to anglophone audiences, but what initially interested me was the code-switching to French. I don’t speak Spanish, and most of my friends don’t speak French, so those few lines always made me feel like they were being sung especially for me. Beyoncé added a few lines in English in her version, so with America’s monumental pride in her and the English language, it’s no surprise that the remix boosted and solidified Mi Gente’s spot as one of the most popular songs in the US for the year.
Mi Gente isn’t the only song of this set to utilize code switching, however. Heila Duila Nach includes the words “frustration” and “depression” towards the end of the song, perhaps to pique the interest of an English-speaking audience. Another common reason for code-switching is to express ideas or emotions more effectively, so Mim may have been trying to articulate her feelings of frustration in a way that her native tongue couldn’t connote. No matter the reason, the song went viral and got over 400,000 views within three days after its release, and it has now garnered over 10 million. Williams’ Voodoo Song is the only one of the set not to have utilized code-switching, but its popularity is not to be understated, with its music video having over 14 million views. However, the original Mi Gente video has over 1.5 trillion, and the Beyoncé remix video has over 74 million.
In comparing the music videos themselves, I noticed an evolution from pieces attempting to gain international appeal, as in Heila Duila Nach, Voodoo Song, and the original Mi Gente, into a clear statement of cross-cultural solidarity in the Beyoncé remix; while the first three songs all have traditional music videos, with carefully crafted shots of the artists singing their lyrics in a set location, the Beyoncé remix video is a compilation of short clips of many different groups of people dancing. These vignettes do not look polished, they seem to be intentionally left raw and natural. The video even has karaoke-esque lyrics along the bottom with images of each artist’s face bouncing along on top of them. This shift truly makes the song feel accessible, as it implies that everyone, no matter their walk of life or style of dancing, is invited to sing along. Combined with the lyrics’ message and Beyoncé’s donation of her profits, the remix fosters a feeling of worldwide solidarity. It code-switches seamlessly between Spanish and French and English, celebrating the artists’ cultural differences and showing that they can be enjoyed by all audiences. There is a more prominent message, however, that unifies all the songs in this set, from the Bengali/Bangladeshi hit to the Spanish sensation: whatever language we speak, sometimes we just need to close our mouths and let our feet do the talking.
Sources:
“‘Mi Gente’ English Lyric Translation: Do You Know what Beyoncé is Saying?” https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/latin/7948973/mi-gente-lyrics-english-translation-meaning-beyonce.
“Beyoncé Joins ‘Mi Gente’ Remix, Donates Proceeds to Hurricane Relief.” https://www.npr.org/sections/altlatino/2017/09/28/554394426/beyonc-joins-j-balvin-and-willy-william-for-mi-gente-remix.
“Beyoncé on Instagram: “I Am Donating My Proceeds from this Song to Hurricane Relief Charities for Puerto Rico, Mexico and the Other Affected Caribbean Islands. to…”.” https://www.instagram.com/p/BZmx_nbH4BT/.
“Code-Switching | Linguistics.” https://www.britannica.com/topic/code-switching.
Heila Duila Nach Lyrics – Ami Tomar Hote Chai | Kona, Akassh. http://bengalilyrics24.blogspot.com/2016/12/heila-duila-nach-ami-tomar-hote-chai.html.
J Balvin & Willy William – Mi Gente, https://genius.com/J-balvin-and-willy-william-mi-gente-lyrics.
“J Balvin Mi Gente Chart History.” http://qa.billboard.com//music/j-balvin.
“J Balvin Talks Latin Music’s Meteoric Rise and Why Working with Beyoncé was Fate.” https://www.fuse.tv/2018/02/j-balvin-mi-gente-beyonce-latin-music-success-interview.
“J Balvin, Willy William – Mi Gente (Official Video).” directed by Anonymous , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnJ6LuUFpMo.
“J Balvin, Willy William – Mi Gente Ft. Beyoncé.” directed by Anonymous , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APHgDFRpCi0.
“Mim’s First Item Song ‘Heila Duila Nach’ Becomes Viral.” http://www.daily-sun.com/post/192113.
Okamoto, Lisa. “Five Reasons Why People Code-Switch.” https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/04/13/177126294/five-reasons-why-people-code-switch.
“Support Relief Efforts Around the World.” https://aws-api-beyonce.parkwood-digital.com/reliefefforts/.
“Willy William – Voodoo Song (Official Music Video).” , directed by Anonymous, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CXrYuLRmgM.
“Willy William – Voodoo Song Translation in English.” https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Willy-William/Voodoo-Song/translation/english.
“Willy William Interview about Mi Gente and Working with J Balvin.” -08-15T07:51:16+00:00, 2017, https://www.somethingaboutmagazine.com/willy-william-interview/.
“Willy William on His Hot 100 Debut & how ‘Mi Gente’ with J Balvin Became a ‘Global Hit’.” https://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/latin/7881749/willy-william-j-balvin-mi-gente-hot-100-interview.
Languages in Conflict 