Bad Gyal

The Catalan cover that started it

Alba Farelo i Solé was born on 7 March 1997 in Barcelona, the eldest of five children. Her father, Eduard Farelo, works as an actor and voice actor; her younger sister Irma records as Mushkaa. At 18 Farelo enrolled at the University of Barcelona to study fashion design, holding down a call-centre job at the same time.

The music started as a side project. In 2016 she posted "Pai", a reworking of Rihanna and Drake's "Work" sung in Catalan. It picked up traffic on YouTube and then local radio play, which was enough to make the side project the main one. Nothing about the premise suggested durability — Catalan-language dancehall had no market to speak of — but the voice on it, flat and unhurried over a sub-heavy riddim, turned out to be the thing people came back for.

Two mixtapes before any deal

Slow Wine Mixtape arrived on 9 November 2016, self-released and made with producer Pablo Martínez. It reached No. 75 in Spain and, more usefully, drew write-ups from Pitchfork and Fact, which put her in front of an audience that had never heard a word of Catalan pop. Worldwide Angel followed on 23 February 2018 through Puro and Canada Editorial, with production from Jam City, Dubbel Dutch, Florentino and El Guincho. It went to No. 11 in Spain.

Those two tapes are still the reference points for anyone arguing that her sound was built in club circles rather than handed to her. The major-label phase began in April 2019, when she signed to Aftercluv and Interscope; her releases have carried Universal Latino and Interscope imprints since.

The chart years

"Santa María", featuring Busy Signal, became her first charting single in Spain in 2019 and was certified gold. "Alocao", with Omar Montes, went to No. 1 in Spain in October 2019 and was certified five times platinum. "Zorra" reached No. 2 that December and returned in February 2021 with a Rauw Alejandro remix. The Warm Up EP peaked at No. 5 on 19 March 2021. "Blin Blin", released in November 2020, did its real work on TikTok.

The widest-reaching record came next. "Chulo" appeared in February 2023; "Chulo pt.2", with Tokischa and Young Miko, followed on 22 June 2023 and was certified six times platinum in the United States and gold in Mexico. She won Best Spanish Act at the 2022 MTV Europe Music Awards, shared in the 2023 Latin Grammy for Album of the Year through her credits on Karol G's Mañana Será Bonito, and took Best EuroSong at Premios Lo Nuestro in 2025 for "Chulo pt.2".

Her debut studio album, La joia, came out on 26 January 2024 — fifteen tracks, No. 1 in Spain. Around it sat "Bota Niña" with Anitta (12 January 2024), "Guay" with Ozuna (18 April 2024, No. 8 in Spain) and "Duro de Verdad pt.2" (12 September 2024), her first bachata, which reached No. 2. A documentary, La Joia: Bad Gyal, premiered at the In-Edit festival in Barcelona on 23 October 2024 and opened in cinemas across Spain and Andorra the following day.

Más Cara and the Caribbean turn

Más Cara was released on 6 March 2026 and debuted at No. 2 in Spain. The Dominican producer Cromo X served as executive producer, and the record was cut across Miami, Puerto Rico, Colombia and Spain. The palette widened considerably: merengue house, guaracha, Jamaican shatta and Haitian kompa sit alongside the reggaeton, dancehall and R&B she had already been working in. Guests include Chencho Corleone, Ozuna and J Álvarez, plus the less established Maureen and 8belial.

The title translates as "more expensive", and the album is framed as a status report on a career now past its tenth year. The lead visual, for "Un coro y ya:)", is set in Barcelona nightlife; the track itself leans on the base and cadence of Ivy Queen's "Yo Quiero Bailar". The run-up was spread over more than a year: "Da Me" in June 2025 (No. 7 in Spain), "Angelito" with Trueno (No. 7) and "Comernos" with Omar Courtz (No. 5), then "Última Noche" with Ozuna, "Fuma" (No. 42) and "Choque" with Chencho Corleone (No. 7).

Critical response has been warmer about the sound than the structure. Listener reviews collected on Album of the Year single out the production as the record's strongest asset while arguing that the second half settles into a predictable pattern after a strong opening stretch.

Where things stand, October 2026

The Más Cara World Tour opened on 20 March 2026 at the Palau Sant Jordi in Barcelona and runs to 8 November — 25 shows across three legs. Demand in the Spanish presale was heavy enough to cause problems on the ticketing platform, and extra nights were added in several cities. The opening Barcelona residency sold out all three dates, with tickets between €45 and €80.

The spring leg stayed in Iberia: Madrid's Movistar Arena on 11, 12 and 14 April; the new Roig Arena in Valencia on 24 April; Bilbao Arena Miribilla in May; the Coliseum in A Coruña on 23 May; Live Sur Stadium in Seville on 29 May. A 4 June show at Barcelona's Parc del Fòrum was cancelled for weather. Festival slots followed at Primavera Sound Porto on 12 June and Roskilde on 4 July.

October took the show to Latin America: Buenos Aires on the 14th with Zé Pequeña opening, Santiago on the 16th with Akatumamy, Bogotá on the 18th, Mexico City's Palacio de los Deportes on the 22nd with Sayuri and Sopholov, Monterrey on the 23rd and Guadalajara on the 25th. The most circulated moment of the leg came in Mexico City on 22 October, when Karina Torres, Wendy Guevara and Paola Suárez — Las Perdidas — walked on and danced through "Fa$hion Killa", clips of which spread across social media overnight.

Six dates remain, all in North America and all in theatres and halls rather than arenas: the Fillmore Miami Beach on 28 October, Coca-Cola Music Hall in San Juan on 30 October, the Riviera Theatre in Chicago on 1 November, Terminal 5 in New York on 4 November, the Wiltern in Los Angeles on 6 November and House of Blues in Dallas on 8 November.

What the reviews are saying

MondoSonoro gave the Barcelona opening 7 out of 10, crediting the range from reggaeton to bachata and the commitment of a 17,000-strong room, while objecting to long blackouts between song blocks, intermittent audio problems and a finale that landed flat despite the noise. Writing in Ara after the 21 March night, Xavier Cervantes described a performer holding a stadium-scale room through composure rather than exertion, with roughly half the set drawn from Más Cara; the Latin-leaning material drew the loudest response and the R&B stretches the least, and he flagged an "expressive monotony" that occasionally thinned the emotional payload.

The Mexico City notices were harder on the venue than the artist. Me Hace Ruido reported a crowd on its feet for the full hour and three-quarters but found the Palacio's acoustics bouncing badly and the lighting design under-powered for a show built so heavily on visual presentation, with almost no spoken address between numbers.