Obsesión

The group's first album sold a total of five copies. They started in the Bronx as Los Tinellers, a Spanish spelling of "teenagers", four young Dominican Americans playing for free on the street and at local stores. A manager renamed them Aventura and styled them like an American boy band, and their 1999 debut fused bachata with R&B, hip-hop and rock, adding wah and distortion to the guitar and slap bass underneath. Traditionalists criticised the new sound heavily, and the mainstream did not yet bite. The break came almost by accident. In 2001, four songs meant for their second album leaked to the public, among them Obsesión. Anthony Santos wrote the words, about a man who adores a woman until it becomes clear the feeling is not love but obsession, and the refrain went to the Dominican-American singer Judy Santos, no relation. Around this time the shy singer created a stage alter ego to play the romantic, taking the name Romeo from a line about Romeo and Juliet in another of the songs. Obsesión carried bachata to countries where the genre had never been heard. It reached number one in seven countries and topped the Eurochart Hot 100. In France it spent seven weeks at the top and became one of the best-selling singles of the century there, and it sold two million copies in Europe alone. Covers by 3rd Wish and Frankie J turned it into a hit all over again. A leaked song by four kids from the Bronx became the moment modern bachata went global.