If you’ve turned on the radio at any time in the past few years, you’ve heard major pop hits — Justin Bieber’s “Sorry,” Drake’s “One Dance,” Major Lazer’s “Lean On,” Luis Fonsi’s Bieber-featuring “Despacito” — that are united by one thing: the syrupy, midtempo grooves of Afro-Caribbean sounds such as dancehall and reggaeton. But fans of the electronic music underground have heard something else: the unmistakable signature of moombahton, a genre with a legendary origin story based in a Prince George’s County, Md., basement that was the hottest trend in dance music at the start of the decade. But in the quickly shifting dance music landscape, moombahton had its big moment, then gave way to the next hot sound. So how did it end up being reborn in some of the biggest pop songs of all time?
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