If you’re a faithful Romeista like me, you know that this potentially basura year was saved when Romeo Santos announced his third solo album Golden would drop in 2017. Today, we’ve finally got the first taste of our favorite baby-voiced bachatero’s new project: a preview of his song “Héroe Favorito.” The short clip opens with a delicate wave of breezy electric guitar chords and drums, before Romeo takes the superhero metaphor and runs with it. “Estoy planeando un secuestro/para robarme tu amor/Mis estrategias no marchan/y crece la imaginación,” he yearns in his signature croon.
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The track revisits a well-worn theme in bachata – saving a damsel in distress. “I’m basically infatuated with this girl; I’m trying to protect her,” Santos told Billboard. “Her parents are trying to set her up with this other guy. In my imagination, I’m like, if I were a superhero, I would protect her. I have strength like Hulk, climb up 100 feet to her balcony like Spider-Man, a lot of metaphors.”
The album artwork finds the singer sporting a full superhero costume, resembling a patchwork rendition of Batman, Zorro, and even Iron Man – masked and ready to steal your girl. To add to the excitement, the superhero version of Santos was designed by Marvel Custom, the comics powerhouse’s marketing and content agency, as they announced on Instagram this morning.
Though Romeo teamed up with Anthony Santos for an ode to kink in 2015, this preview is the first solo material we’ve heard from Romeo since he dropped his celebrated Formula, Vol. 2 in 2014. True to his history of shaking up bachata tradition, Romeo told Billboard that “Héroe Favorito” infuses the Dominican genre with impressionistic jazz. “If you’re a bachata fan and you’re like, ‘I don’t really know if I dig jazz,’ I don’t think it’s going to be a problem,” he explains.
The full song drops on Monday, February 13, so keep an eye out. We’re officially on album watch for the King of Bachata.
[H/T Billboard]