Tatiana at her Edgiest
Written: Dec 02 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Tatiana successfully adopts a harder-rocking style than is usual for her.
Cons: This style didn't last, as she shifted to other styles later.
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| dtobias's Full Review: Un Lobo En La Noche by Tatiana |
Un Lobo en La Noche, released in 1988 according to Tatiana's official website (though my copy shows a 1989 copyright date; this may be because it's a U.S. version made later than the original Mexican release), is the first of her transition albums between "teen pop" and her later more "adult" and "sophisticated" fare. She was very popular in the Latin music scene at the time, having had five years of success, longer than most teen pop stars manage. This was her fourth regular album (plus one rock-opera soundtrack, Kumán); Tiffany and Debbie Gibson were floundering by their third albums, and the jury is still out on Britney Spears and the rest of the current crop of young stars, so she was doing pretty good.
For this fourth album, Tatiana decided to get a little more hard-rocking than her earlier light pop. This style, where she seemed to be aiming to be a Latin version of Pat Benatar or Joan Jett, could be seen as a stretch for her given that her normal style has run much more in the direction of sweetness and light. That she did manage to do a good job at this style shows her versatility and talent. However, after this album, her subsequent "mature" style tended to run more to moody ballads and less to this sort of rock, though she did do a few more songs of this sort in her next few "adult" albums before her style and direction shifted once more to the children's music she now performs. I see from her website that her next release is to be titled "Acapulco Rock," so maybe something "rocking" is in her near future. (See her site at http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/Studio/5685/ -- the "official" address, www.tatilandia.com, currently has an under-construction page. Meanwhile, I maintain an independent Tatiana fan site at www.chicadehoy.org.)
Here are the songs on the album:
1) Comico: This word means "actor" or "comedian" in Spanish. There was a comic book publisher called "Comico" during the early stages of the '80s independent comics craze (I'm not positive whether they're still in business), but I think that name was derived simply from "Comic Co." rather than the Spanish word. The vocal style is maybe a little lighter than some of the other songs on this album, but it's got a driving beat.
2) Peligro en el Elevador (Danger in the Elevator): A catchy, rocking song. The video for it featured her being chased by some vaguely menacing-looking people down a street and into a building, where she took the elevator up through several floors (on one of which there was some sort of bar or nightclub, strange for an office building), ending up on the roof where the pursuers caught up to her and showed a copy of her album that they apparently wanted her to autograph. At one point in the song, she mentions "basketball", and the video then shows her in the elevator with a whole basketball team (in uniform with one player holding a ball). I don't know what that's all supposed to mean, but it's pretty weird. She also magically changes outfits a few times (a technique she uses sometimes now on her children's TV show), to different variants on black and white polka-dot dresses.
3) Nunca Te Enamores De Un Vividor (Never Fall in Love with a Parasite): A lighter-style song than the others on this album, relatively soft and slow.
4) El Seductor (The Seducer): Back to a harder, edgier sound now. But not really that much of a melody.
5) Un Lobo En La Noche (A Wolf in The Night): The title track; pretty catchy. She sings the title line in a slurred way that makes it hard to make out the words, unusually for her. (I do remember reading once in a linguistics book that many languages engage in "taboo deformation" of words for predator animals like wolves and bears, out of apparent fear that saying their names will somehow bring on an attack by the animal, and that's caused the distortion of these words as languages evolve.) She released an English version of this song, "A Werewolf In The Night", as a single and as a music video, though it's not on this album; on that, she sings the title line clearly.
6) No Tengo Novio (I Don't Have a Boyfriend): Another catchy song. However, I don't think it was true; she married her husband, Andrés, just two years after this album came out, and was probably dating him already when she sang this. The English version of this was on the flip side of the "Werewolf in the Night" single (according to a secondhand report I heard from somebody else; I don't actually have it).
7) Sola Entre Tus Brazos (Alone Between Your Arms): A little slower, but it's still got a beat.
8) Quien Soy Yo (Who Am I): This starts as a slow, soft song, but gets louder as it proceeds before quieting down a little at the very end.
9) Heroes del Mañana (Heroes of Tomorrow): Back to the hard-driving style.
10) Noche Oriental (Eastern Night): Back to a lighter style to end the album.
Overall, a nice varied album, with more catchy stuff than some of her subsequent albums where she was trying to be a little too "sophisticated".
Recommended:
Yes
Great Music to Play While: Getting ready to go out
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dtobias
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Member: Daniel Tobias
Location: Boca Raton, FL
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A programmer and Internet developer who's been a "computer geek" for over 20 years now.
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