When did Peso Pluma realize he’d made it? Was it performing alongside Becky G at Coachella? Singing “Ella Baila Sola,” his collab with the group Eslabon Armado, on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon?” Was it at his sold-out April show — his first stateside performance — in Ontario, Calif., where he beamed as thousands of fans sang the lyrics of “Por Las Noches,” an early hit, back to him?

Or, perhaps, it hasn’t completely sunk in yet. The Guadalajara native is a swiftly rising star of regional Mexican music, which includes corridos, norteño, banda and other genres that have long been popular across Mexico and the Southwestern United States. Groups such as Los Tigres del Norte and Los Bukis routinely sold out arenas around Latin America and in the United States (particularly in heavily Latino Texas and California) in the decades leading up to the early aughts. In the streaming era, regional Mexican music has become increasingly popular beyond those borders, thanks to a new generation of artists eager to collaborate across genres. But it’s never really had a global star.

Peso Pluma, whose moniker translates to “featherweight” in Spanish, has emerged a likely contender for that title just three years after he began releasing music through Los Angeles-based indie label, El Cártel De Los Ángeles. (He’s now signed to Prajin Music Group, where he launched his own indie label, Double P Records, in April.) This year, eight of his songs have landed on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, where “Ella Baila Sola” (“She Dances Alone”) — written by Eslabon Armado’s Pedro Tovar — became the first regional Mexican song to reach the chart’s Top 10. (It hit No. 1 on the global pop chart and, according to Spotify, has been streamed more than 465 million times). His most successful tracks include collaborations with Natanael Cano, whose 2019 breakout via Los Angeles indie label Rancho Humilde introduced “corridos tumbados” — a trap-infused approach to traditional corridos, narrative-based songs that have been popular since the Mexican revolution — and Mexican American pop singer Becky G.

“This is just the beginning for us,” Peso Pluma says in a brief interview with The Washington Post. Though the name “Peso Pluma” — sometimes shortened to “Doble P” (“Double P”) — refers to the singer himself, he tends to talk about Peso Pluma as “a project” or “team” that includes his cousin, songwriter-producer Jesús Roberto Laija García, and other frequent collaborators. This has added an air of mystery to the musician — real name: Hassan Emilio Kabande Laija — and his strong presence on the pop charts.

Peso Pluma is “one of the most explosive and exponential growth stories in the era of music streaming,” said Antonio Vázquez, head of U.S. Latin editorial at Spotify.

The singer’s rapid ascent can be attributed in part to the algorithm. Latin music has seen tremendous growth in the streaming era — the Recording Industry Association of America said in a recent report that Latin music revenue reached a record $1.1 billion last year — and regional Mexican is a particularly vast genre that lends itself well to curated playlists designed to help users discover more music. On Spotify, there are dozens of regional Mexican playlists that skew as niche as “corridos about horses.” TikTok has also been a boon for the evolving genre: “Ella Baila Sola” went viral on the platform following its release in March.

Peso Pluma stands out because of his distinctive voice — raspy beyond his 23 years and prone to trombone-like bursts. His verse on “Ella Baila Sola” begins with a hearty “Bella” that has inspired a slew of TikToks: “Say ‘Bella’ like Peso Pluma,” video creators beckon in various settings — with often hilarious results. Other videos on the platform seem to exist solely to unpack the mystery around Doble P, who somehow looks like both Will and Mike from “Stranger Things,” and sports a mullet that some fans clamor to copy. The artist doesn’t pay close attention to the memes but, he says, “I’m aware of what’s happening and I think it’s a big movement.”

The reach and aesthetic of regional Mexican music has expanded in the hands of Gen Z-ers who, like the genre’s newest artists, grew up listening to regional Mexican music and hip-hop, including (but not limited to) reggaeton. Fans and artists are coming from both sides of the border (Peso Pluma attended high school in San Antonio). “More than 50 percent of Latin music listeners are below the age of 30 years,” Vázquez said. “It’s a really young audience with a lot of purchasing power and a lot of consumption power.”

That power was on display this year at Coachella, which has continued to add more regional Mexican artists since 2019, when norteño group Los Tucanes de Tijuana became the first regional Mexican act to perform at the festival. Last year’s lineup included Cano (of Rancho Humilde fame), Grupo Firme and Banda MS. This year, Conexión Divina and Danny Lux took the stage. Becky G’s set featured appearances by several collaborators including Peso Pluma, Marca MP and Fuerza Regida’s Jesús Ortiz Paz.

Just days after Becky G and Peso Pluma performed their duet “Chanel” for the Coachella crowd, festival co-headliner Bad Bunny released a song with Grupo Frontera, a norteño band from McAllen, Tex. “Un x100to” (“One percent”), a tequila-drowned message to a lost love, quickly joined “Ella Baila Sola” on the Top 100 chart.

Bad Bunny previously teamed up with Cano for a remix of the Sonora native’s “Soy El Diablo.” Regional Mexican musician Danny Felix, who produced that track, has credited the Puerto Rican rapper with helping to popularize trap corridos. “That’s when the corridos tumbados picked up,” Felix told culture site Remezcla earlier this year. “It’s thanks to Bad Bunny because since then everybody was like, ‘It’s ok for us to do it because Bad Bunny did it already.’”

Cano later worked with veteran reggaetonero Nicky Jam on “Billetes,” which was produced by Play-N-Skillz, a production duo from Dallas. Felix co-wrote “200 Copas,” a corrido-style track that appeared on Colombian singer Karol G’s 2021 album “KG0516.” Her latest album, “Mañana Será Bonito” channels the singer’s love of mariachi into “Gucci Los Paños,” a song about heartbreak and very expensive tissues.

Bad Bunny’s collaboration with Grupo Frontera highlights the rate at which these not-so-regional genres are evolving. Grupo Frontera was just months out from their indie-released debut EP when the band’s lovesick “No Se Va” (“Won’t Go Away”) — a cover of a 2019 single by Colombian folk-pop group Morat — became only the fifth song by a regional Mexican act to reach the Hot 100.

“I think it was the seasoning that we put with the congas,” vocalist Juan Javier Cantú told Billboard of the song’s runaway success. “It doesn’t sound like your typical norteño song; in fact, it sounds like something fresh with that reggaeton vibe.”