El Disco Duro

Background

El Disco Duro (originally titled King Daddy II: Elemento DY) was going to be the sequel of his previous studio album King Daddy, released in October 2013, which was originally part of Los De La Nazza's El Imperio Nazza mixtape series, but became a standalone album. It was recorded in two weeks and didn't have much promotion because of being a less elaborated album in terms of production in comparisson of his previous ones. However, King Daddy became the first digital-only Latin album that managed to appear in the top 10 of Billboard's Top Latin Albums and its main single, "La Nueva y La Ex", received significant airplay in Latin America and on US Latin radio stations. About two months after the release of King Daddy, he announced that there was going to be a physical version of the album, with exclusive bonus tracks, planned to be released during 2014, but it wasn't published after all.

The production duo Los De La Nazza, which has been working with him since 2007, left El Cartel Records and stopped being his main producers in order to focus on their careers. Because of that, Yankee hired three producers, Nekxum, Fenndel and Oreo Beatzzz, in order to start recording the album and create instrumentals. Eduard Fenndel stopped working because of health problems and Oreo Beatzzz left the label in order to dedicate to trap music and producing for new Latin urban artists. After five months of work, producers Chris Jeday and Gaby Music were hired as the album's main producers. El Disco Duro was officially announced during mid-2014 as King Daddy II with the promotion of the single "Sábado Rebelde" featuring Plan B, released on 31 October. During 2015 were released other two singles: "Sígueme y Te Sigo" and "Vaivén", both reached the top position on Billboard's Latin Rhythm Airplay chart, tying Daddy Yankee and Wisin & Yandel as the artists with most No. 1 songs in the list, with 14 each.

During early 2015, he signed new rapper Brytiago to his label. Daddy Yankee first met him as an eight-year-old fan in 2000, but they met again 14 years later in a gym, Brytiago now as an artist, because of a common friend, and showed him some of his songs. Two weeks later, Yankee called him in order to work together at El Cartel Records' studio and after some weeks he showed his approval, deciding to sign him and also including him on the song "Alerta Roja", which became one of the biggest collaborations in reggaeton history.

In 2015 a special joint concert by Daddy Yankee and Don Omar called The Kingdom was announced at the Puerto Rican José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum, which was divided into four shows between 3 December and 6 December 2015. The idea was to show both artists performing their career hits and then having a rap battle, featuring ring announcers Michael and Bruce Buffer. During late November, both artists released their own diss tracks to each other in order to promote the shows. The concerts were produced by Raphy Pina and its last show was foccused on collecting money to charity for a children's hospital in Puerto Rico. In 2016, The Kingdom became a tour around the United States, starting on 30 July at the Madison Square Garden in New York and ending on 27 August at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. After the shows there were a series of online surveys about "Who's the King of Reggaeton", most of them were led by Daddy Yankee, who won in Billboard and Telemundo's surveys, with 979 votes to 663 and 900.031 to 774.115, respectively.

In April 2016, he was involved with the Panama Papers cases after the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) made public a series of documents that implicated him with offshore companies created for his concerts in Peru in 2006, in which the show's rights were given in exchange of $350,000 that were transferred to a foreign bank account through Arion Investments LLC. A month later, the Puerto Rican Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (Spanish for Investigative Journalism Center) revealed that he and his label El Cartel Records owe in total $3 million to the American Internal Revenue Service (IRS) since 2013, year in which the Argentinian producer Diego de Iraola won a trial against him for breach of contract and defamation after a cancelled tour trough Argentina in 2010.

He also was the coach on the third and fourth seasons of American talent show La Voz Kids alongside Natalia Jiménez and Pedro Fernández, also serving as a vocal coach to his team members, claiming that he actually knows about music despite being criticized for the genre he represents. His Team Yankee finalists, Cuban Franser Pazos and Puerto Rican Axel Cabrera, were runners-up in season 3 and 4, respectively.

As to awards between July 2015 and February 2017, Daddy Yankee won three out of five nominations for Favorite Urban Artist: twice in the Premios Tu Mundo and once in the Latin American Music Awards; on the other hand, he was nominated twice in the Premios Juventud. His single "Sígueme y Te Sigo" won a Latin American Music Award for Favorite Urban Song and was nominated for a Latin Grammy Award for Best Urban Song and Best Urban Performance. He also received a special Billboard Latin Music Award in 2016 for Industry Leader and was nominated for Latin Rhythm Songs Artist of the Year. His fanbase DYArmy was also the winner of two Premios Tu Mundo for Fan Club of the Year. On February 2017 he received six nominations on the Lo Nuestro Awards, including Urban Artist of the Year and Urban Song of the Year for "Vaivén", with no wins.

On 10 September, he was urgently moved to a nearby hospital in Cali, Colombia, where he was set to perform later that night. Yankee suffered a rise in blood pressure, hypoglycemia and dehydration, which almost caused him to suffer a heart attack before being treated by doctors. His condition improved and he was sent to rest in his native Puerto Rico, but had to cancel other concerts in Colombia. On 16 October, he received a special award during the People en Español Festival in honor to his career. Three days later, Yankee confirmed that his hypoglycemia worsened and turned into a prediabetes, just like one of his daughters, who also suffers from that illness.

In December, Daddy Yankee had a special series of sold-out concerts in the José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum on 3, 4, 16 and 17 December with Nicky Jam in commemoration of the year they became friends, in 1996. They collaborated on various songs and forged a great friendship until 2004, when they fell out over Nicky Jam's drug problems and behaviour. In 2011, Nicky apologized in person for his behavior, after which they became friends again and recorded a bonus track for the album Prestige, released in 2012. After Nicky's international success with his hit single "El Perdón", he and Yankee began working together more frequently and in October 2016 they announced concert dates in Puerto Rico. The shows' main characteristic was the importance given to old school reggaeton tracks that were performed, including a DJ Playero songs medley, "Cógela Que Va Sin Jockey" (Más Flow, 2003), "Tu Caldo" (Blin Blin, Vol. 1, 2003), "Segurosqui" (Los Homerun-es, 2003), "No Me Dejes Sólo" (Barrio Fino, 2004), "Saoco" (with Wisin, El Sobreviviente, 2004) and their collaborations "En La Cama" (Haciendo Escante, 2001) and "Guayando" (El Cangri.com, 2002).

In January 2017 was released the reggaeton-pop single "Despacito", a collaboration between him and the Puerto Rican pop singer Luis Fonsi. The song was a commercial success, breaking a Vevo record for the Spanish-language music video with most views on its first 24 hours and topping the Argentine, Chilean, Colombian, Ecuadorian, Guatemalan, Mexican, Panamanian, Spanish and US Billboard's Hot Latin Songs music charts. It also managed to chart in other 14 European countries, reaching the top 10 in Italy, Portugal and Switzerland.

Release

Daddy Yankee confirmed on 26 October 2016 during a meeting with Zumba fitness creator Beto Perez at Pina Records that El Disco Duro will be released during early 2017, most likely during January or February. In December 2014, Billboard magazine added digital and streaming information to count sales: 1,000 digital songs sales and 1,500 song streams separately equal one album sale, which may affect the chart placement of the album. Considered on-demand audio services includes Spotify, Google Play, Beats Music and Xbox Music.

Singles

Other releases

Track listing

To be announced.

The following table is in order of release and is not the official track listing. Some songs may not appear on the final album. Unreleased tracks are marked and start at No. 9.

Other