Music Review: Pitbull - El Mariel

Well, when I asked the nice people at TVT to send me the new album of Cuban rapper Pitbull for review, I didn't expect to receive an all-English album (as I run a Latin music blog). I'm not a fan of Pitbull's earlier works (standard US club hip hop), but I requested the album mainly because of the title. El Mariel refers to the Mariel boatlift, a critical episode in the history of Cuban-American relationships. Maybe Pitbull wanted to step up and raise awareness on the whole Cuba-USA thing?

Turns out he didn't. He's just gangsta rappin' and club bangin' like before, El Mariel only being mentioned in the interludes, by other people. What's left is just another collection of hip hop songs.

So seriously biased by all these disappointments, I had a few listens anyway. And to my surprise, a few nice songs came up: "Miami Shit" (with epic rock guitars and trumpets), "Jungle Fever" (featuring Wyclef Jean, has nice percussion and sexy female backing vocals), "Fuego" (quick-paced diss song). This is mostly thanks to the impressive production team behind the album: Diaz Brothers, Lil Jon, DJ Khaled, Mr. Collipark, Jim Jonson, The Runners, and The Neptunes. They kept beats and samples to a minimum, realizing Pitbull's voice is strong enough to carry the song.

On the bad side: the club tracks ("Bojangles" featuring Lil Jon & Ying Yang Twins, "Ay Chico", "Descarada") will probably be medium successes on the East Coast, but there's no new "Culo" hidden on El Mariel. And the only Spanish track ("Dime" featuring reggaetonero Ken-Y) is a badly sung ballad, not even worth mentioning.

Conclusion: a mediocre album, maybe because I expected more Spanish and more political awareness.

Article Author: Chapin

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