Romeo Santos and Prince Royce turned a Halloween gag into a full rollout.
On October 31, Santos hit Instagram dressed as Ace Ventura, teasing a “new album November 28” and sending fans scrambling to preorder what everyone assumed was his next solo project.
What nobody knew: the “king” and “prince” of bachata were about to release a joint album, Better Late Than Never, a 13-track set that dropped on Friday, November 28, on Sony Music Latin.
The project had been in motion for years. In an interview with Billboard, the pair revealed their first attempt at recording together dates back to 2017, with two more songs cut in later sessions that also stayed in the vault.
Santos says they eventually scrapped all three and went back to the drawing board, determined to build something that felt organic instead of a quick feature swap.
To keep things quiet, Romeo Santos and Prince Royce avoided public studios and worked in private spaces—Santos’ home setup in New York, Royce’s spot, and even rented villas while on vacation with friends and family.
Musicians were brought in separately, so most of them thought they were playing on a solo project. Even some relatives, including Royce’s own brother, didn’t realize both artists were involved until they saw their names together on a call sheet.
Better Late Than Never opens with its title track and blends both artists’ styles across classic bachata, modern experiments, and mostly romantic lyrics. Songs like “Dardos” and “Jezebel” stretch into R&B and Afrobeat territory, while “Ay San Miguel” taps Dominican palo. “Menor” introduces rising artist Dalvin La Melodía, who recorded his feature without knowing Royce was also on the album.
Santos and Royce co-wrote four tracks: “Mi Plan,” born during a trip to St. Barts in 2023, plus “Better Late Than Never,” “Jezabel,” and “Loquita Por Mí.”
The rest of the tracklist is primarily penned by Santos, with Royce giving feedback in sessions. Both describe the final balance as fully collaborative, with no song leaning heavily toward one voice.
There were no advance singles. Instead, a two-song video for “Estocolmo” and “Dardos” has landed alongside the album, continuing the secret-code strategy the duo used during filming, where Santos went by “Batman” and Royce by “Robin.”