[en] | Junior H

Antonio Herrera Pérez was born on 23 April 2001, in the municipality of Cerano, Yuriria Guanajuato, Mexico.^[3] At the age of 12, he and one of his friends would begin to write lyrics since they did not know how to play instruments yet. He lived his childhood in Cerano until the age of 15 when he and his family moved to the United States in 2015, in the state of Utah.^[4] At the age of 17, while in high school, he worked as a cook at a local Wendy’s restaurant and learned to play different instruments during his spare time, by watching videos on YouTube, including the accordion and the guitar.^[5][6]

One day, Pérez decided to upload songs he had already made on YouTube under the name “Junior H,” without telling any of his friends or family.^[7] Having not checked for a month on the songs he had uploaded, out of curiosity, he checked his songs on YouTube and upon seeing that his single “No Eh Cambiado” had more than 2 million views ^[8] and several supportive comments, he put more focus on his independent musical project.^[9]

On 2 February 2019, Herrera released his debut album Mi Vida en un Cigarro, with nine songs. Among them was his first renowned single “No He Cambiado” and other songs such as “Mi Vida en un Cigarro” and “El de la Chevy”.^[10] Contacted by Jimmy Humilde that same year, he joined Humilde’s record label Rancho Humilde, where he met labelmate Natanael Cano, who is also a Mexican singer, with whom he collaborated on the single “Disfruto lo Malo” on his acclaimed album Corridos Tumbados, which also includes “Ella”, a song that Herrera had written by himself.^[11]

In 2020, Herrera released his second studio album titled Atrapado en un Sueño, which features his most recognized songs such as its title track “Atrapado en un Sueño”, “Mente Positiva” and “Jueves 10”. The album was positioned in the top five of the Billboard Top Latin Albums chart, marking Herrera’s first chartings in any album chart.^[12] Later that year, on September 2, he would release two albums that same day, Cruisin’ with Junior H and Musica <3, which contain 12 songs on each album.^[13] On December 18, together with Natanael Cano and Ovi, they released the album Las 3 Torres, including 16 songs which feature artists such as Snoop Dogg, Ñengo Flow and Snow Tha Product.^[14]

On 12 February 2021, Herrera released $ad Boyz 4 Life, with 16 songs, whose lyrics talk about love and heartbreak.^[15] In less than 24 hours, the album managed to position itself in the top spot of Apple Music‘s Latin Albums chart. Some of his recognized songs from the album are “La Bestia”, “160 Gramos”, “Me Consume”, and a cover of Enanitos Verdes‘ hit single “Lamento Boliviano“. On 7 February 2022, he announced and revealed the tracklist of his seventh studio album titled Mi Vida en un Cigarro 2, in reference to the name of his first album, which was officially released on February 11.^[16]

Months later, Herrera announced that he was working on a new album, but it contained Latin trap songs, which would be his first and only album of that genre, said Herrera himself. In October, he revealed the release date of his album, which would be 11 November, although days later he changed it to a later date that would be the official one, 23 November of that same year. At the end of 2022, the album would be released as Contingente, which also consists of collaborations with other well-known artists such as Alemán, Big Soto, Ovi, Paloma Mami, and Snow Tha Product.^[17]

In January 2023, Herrera released the single “Fin de Semana” with Oscar Maydon, which debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 on number 86, making it both artists’ first time appearing in the chart.^[18] In February, Herrera collaborated with Mexican musician and singer Peso Pluma on “El Azul“, which marked both artists’ first collaboration together.^[19] Herrera and Peso Pluma became frequent collaborators and had collaborated on “El Tsurito”, “Lady Gaga,”^[20] “Luna”, and “Bipolar“.^[21] “Lady Gaga” had peaked at No. 1 on the Mexico Songs and Hot Latin Songs charts, making this Junior H’s first number 1 debut on both charts.^[22] On 7 July, Junior H collaborated with reggaeton artist Rauw Alejandro, on the song “Picardía”, from Alejandro’s album Playa Saturno.^[23] In 14 September, he and norteño group Grupo Frontera, released the single “En Altavoz”, from the group’s debut album, El Comienzo.^[24] On 6 October, Junior H released his eighth studio album $ad Boyz 4 Life II,^[25] in which Herrera refers it as “more of an accident” since there were supposedly going to be featured artists in the album.^[26][27] In 3 November, Junior H and Grupo Marca Registrada released “Mafiosa”, marking it both artists’ second collaboration.^[28] In 13 November 2023, Junior H appeared on El Alfa‘s album El Rey del Dembow, on the song “Aqui Ta Smoke”, alongside Pop Smoke.^[29]

Junior H is known for being one of the most important figures of the corridos tumbados subgenre, along with Natanael Cano, which are also referred as trap corridos. He also incorporates elements of Latin trap and reggaeton in his music, though the singer’s debut on the latter genre would be on “Picardía” with Rauw Alejandro.^[23][30] The title for his Latin trap album Contingente was chosen because he thought it would be the last time the singer created any album in those genres.^[31]

The lyrics Junior H writes are about what is influential and what is devastating, usually relationships,^[32] in which music with such lyrics is often referred as urban sierreño or “sad” sierreño, a genre inspired by Ariel Camacho. In the song “1004 Kilómetros”, taken from the singer’s album $ad Boyz 4 Life, the lyrics are about and are dedicated to Junior H’s mom, who lived 1004 kilometers away from him at the time. The lyrics represent a long-distance relationship.^[33]

Spanish rappers Yung Beef and C. Tangana and Mexican rapper Alemán have said that they’ve listened to Junior H’s music. Bad Bunny once posted himself on an Instagram story listening to a Junior H song.^[30]

Notes