Shakira opens up about the anxious wait for Burna Boy’s verse on ‘Dai Dai,’ the 2026 World Cup anthem now smashing global streaming records
Twenty days of silence. That’s how long Shakira sat wondering if her dream collaboration was ever going to happen.
The Colombian superstar has finally opened up about the tense, nerve-wracking process behind “Dai Dai,” her chart-topping team-up with Burna Boy that became the official anthem of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. And it turns out even global icons deal with the same anxiety the rest of us feel waiting for a text back.
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Shakira explained that once she had the bones of the song down, something felt missing. The track leaned heavily into Afrobeats, mixed with touches of Caribbean rhythm and R&B, and she felt it needed a strong male voice to match the tournament’s energy.
That search led her straight to one name.
Shakira admitted she’d wanted to work with Burna Boy long before this project came along. So she reached out directly, and he agreed. But then, nothing.
For nearly three weeks, she heard nothing back and started second-guessing whether he’d follow through at all. Then, without warning, his verse landed, and she says it was exactly what the song needed.
That mix of doubt and payoff is something anyone who’s ever waited on a collaborator, a colleague, or even a friend can relate to.
Whatever anxiety went into making it clearly didn’t show in the final product. Since dropping in May, “Dai Dai” has racked up hundreds of millions of streams and views, and following their joint performance at the World Cup halftime show, it shot to the top of Apple Music’s Global 100 chart.
That achievement makes Burna Boy only the second Nigerian artist ever to top that particular chart, following Tems’ earlier milestone. It’s another marker in a year that’s already seen him named Africa’s best-selling artist of all time.
Behind every massive hit, there’s usually a smaller, more human story, one of doubt, patience, and a bit of faith in someone else’s process. Shakira’s
