“TQG” by KAROL G & Shakira

As of the release of “TQG” on 24 February 2023, Karol G and Shakira have long established themselves as the two most-popular female singers from Colombia. The latter, with a discography dating all the way back to 1991, is the elder stateswoman in this equation, while Karol G’s own commenced in 2007.

However, this outing – which is backed by UMG and one of its subsidiaries, Universal Music Latino – marks the first collaboration between the songstresses.

This is a track which was first officially teased, in a manner of speaking, by Karol G about a week before its release. It came out as part of Mañana Será Bonito (tr. “Tomorrow Will Be Pretty”), which is Karol G’s fourth studio album.

And even as now, just a few days after its issuance, “TQG “has already achieved notable success, such as charting in a handful of Latin American countries, including making it onto the top 10 of the Monitor Latino chart in Panama. Via streaming revenue, it also reportedly made the two singers about $30,000 each within 12 hours of being posted online.

So what we’re dealing with here is a song rendered in Spanish. Both of the vocalists have experience in successfully dropping tracks in English, but in this case the lyrics are relayed entirely in their native tongue.

“TQG” (“TE QUEDÓ GRANDE”)

The title of this song is an acronym representing the phrase “te quedó grande”. If you were to log that phrase into Google, in English it reads “you got too big”, though others have offered that it more accurately translates to something like “I’m too big for you”. So the presumption going into this piece is that there’s an addressee who’s bound to get dissed therein.

And it just so happens that said addressee is the vocalist’s ex. When it comes to female singers nowadays, an increasing number of them are dealing with such matters, i.e. addressing the man who broke their heart, with vindictive tones. And so it is basically with “TQG”, which is relatively-detailed but isn’t particularly anything we haven’t heard before.

The thesis sentiment revolves around a celebration of the singer’s ex coming to realize that things haven’t proven as gravy as he presumed when he did her dirty.

At the center of said celebration is the vocalist’s belief, based on social media evidence, that her ex wants her back. And yes, he has moved on to another lady, who she would undoubtedly be perturbed to discover that he’s concurrently showing interest in Karol/Shakira.

Meanwhile, the vocalist has also moved on with her life and is now, by the looks of things, doing better than ever. That reality is also contributing to her ex wanting her back, while his new girlfriend is failing to keep him up properly.

ARE THESE SENTIMENTS TRUE TO THE ARTISTS’ LIFE?

Both Karol and Shakira have been in serious celebrity relationships. The former was engaged to fellow Latin American music star Anuel AA for a couple of years. And Shakira has most notably been involved with a star soccer player named Gerard Piqué, whom she actually birthed a couple of children for.

Also to note, she dropped a pretty-overt diss track against Piqué, who she had recently broken up with after being with him for a decade, just last month. But as Karol and Anuel, according to AA everything is all good between the two of them.

So it can be postulated that maybe Shakira is relaying these sentiments to Gerard, though there doesn’t appear to be any direct evidence that supports such a claim per se. And it also wouldn’t be out of the way to presume that both ladies may have probably dealt with the likes of unfaithful exes in the past, since such is pretty common these days, i.e. these types of songs.

Besides that a couple of other writers, Keityn and Ovy on the Drums (the producer of the track), contributed to the penning of “TQG” alongside the two vocalists. So we will take it that the lyrics may not be as relatable to Gerard Piqué and Anuel AA as some conspiracy theorists would like. Or in any event, as far as we know there hasn’t been any published proof that the two of them are still respectively “looking for” Shakira and Karol.

“Bebé, ¿qué fue?, ¿no pues que muy tragaíto’? (-íto’)
¿Qué hace’ buscándome el la’o? Si sabes que yo errore’ no repito (Eh, papi)
Dile a tu nueva bebé que por hombre’ no compito
Que deje de estar tirando, que al meno’ yo te tenía bonito”