Consumer Guide Album

Hot Latin Hits/Exitos Latinos Calientes: The '90s [Rhino, 1998]
Doing my bit to nip a world-lounge fad in the bud, I hereby deplore not just a record but an entire sensibility--the florid Spanish-language romanticism at the root of the international ballad style. Performed mostly by one-named singers like Mijares, Lucero, Cristian, and Julian, these early-'90s cris de coeur are all the excuse any young Spanish speaker needs to believe Los Fabulosos Cadillacs are the Beatles. Emotion so deeply in love with itself is why irony was invented. D+