{"id":41854,"date":"2010-01-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-01-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/destiny-2\/"},"modified":"2010-01-21T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-01-21T00:00:00","slug":"destiny-2","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/destiny-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Destiny"},"content":{"rendered":"

After conquering the pop world in the mid \u201880s, Gloria Estefan rode out that decade in style with her biggest selling album, Cuts Both Ways<\/i>. Since that release, though, her most inspired moment came with the Latin beauty Mi Tierra<\/i>. Her pop albums seemed to lack the spark and Latin flavor that made her \u201880s output so exciting. Into The Light <\/i>was too long and melodramatic, and her horrible covers album Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me <\/i>is still by far her worst effort ever.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Following the success of Mi Tierra <\/i>and the birth of her second child, Gloria decided to return to her roots and make her next album in a much more organic style. Gone are the layered synths and drum machines; these were replaced with beautiful strings, lots of acoustic guitars, and percussion. The result is, of course, her most focused and original pop album. Gloria\u2019s voice continued to improve with age, and her lyrics for the most part are truly heartfelt and revealing.\u00a0 Destiny<\/i> is one of the best pop albums I\u2019ve ever heard, and now, fourteen years after its release, it has lost none of its appeal.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to describe an exact sound that best sums up the overall ambience of Destiny<\/i>, but it is essentially an international one. Obviously, Gloria\u2019s Latin roots are clearly evident but there\u2019s also European, Middle Eastern, and African beats and melodies running throughout the disc.\u00a0 And while Estefan has primarily been known as a dance pop singer, it is the intoxicating mid-tempo songs on Destiny<\/i> that really shine.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Rich, soulful love songs like \u201cThe Heart Never Learns\u201d and the Diane Warren-penned \u201cShow Me The Way Back To Your Heart\u201d are almost perfect, and while the latter could have been another signature mushy Warren ballad, in the hands of the reenergized Miami Sound Machine, it\u2019s transformed into a acoustic masterpiece.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Destiny<\/i> also contains some of Gloria\u2019s most personal lyrics, especially on tracks written about her husband and daughter. \u201cAlong Came You (A Song For Emily)\u201d is probably the most revealing and honest song I\u2019ve ever heard from a parent to a child, while \u201cI\u2019m Not Giving You Up\u201d again reveals the emotional journey of the Estefan\u2019s enduring marriage.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

These sentiments are again explored with another powerful cut in \u201cSteal Your Hear,\u201d which probably contains too many words, but with some crafty phrasing and backed by a simple melody, Estefan handles it with ease. My two favorite tracks on the album are the glorious title cut and a brilliant song called \u201cPath Of The Right Love.\u201d Both are mid-tempo and quite dramatic musically, with the latter being a more Latin affair and the former sporting one of the most enchanting melodies I\u2019ve ever heard. \u201cI Know You Too Well\u201d is the one song that sounds very \u201880s \u2013 in a good way, of course \u2013 and as you can tell by the title, it\u2019s another love song for hubby.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

All of this and still no dancing \u2013 but I\u2019ll get to that in a minute. By far the most memorable song on this album is \u201cReach,\u201d which Gloria wrote with Diane Warren. It was used as the official theme for the 1996 Olympics held in Atlanta, and it gets the job done in the sense that musically it\u2019s again very \u201cinternational\u201d and lyrically it\u2019s very uplifting.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

So the dancing. One of Gloria\u2019s best dance numbers surfaced here with the Latin beats and sexy horns of \u201cYou\u2019ll Be Mine (Party Time),\u201d which became an instant fan- favorite on the massive Evolution Tour <\/i>that supported this record. The other track made for dancing is the chill-out groove of \u201cHigher,\u201d which is just as much fun but not as noisy. Both add much needed light into what is a very mood-driven and introspective collection of songs.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Destiny<\/i> is the best English-language album Gloria has ever made, and along with 1993\u2019s Mi Tierra<\/i>, it represents the best of what she has to offer. This is the best pop album of the \u201890s \u2013 I\u2019d take this baby over Madge\u2019s Ray Of Light <\/i>or MJ\u2019s Dangerous<\/i> any day. But that\u2019s the kinda guy I am, because Gloria will always be my Miami Vice.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":30208,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[7311],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-41854","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-gloria-estefan","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41854"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=41854"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=41854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}