Sony
Pop, 2003

Poor Ricky Martin. His successful English breakthrough is a double-edged sword. The American audience that pays no attention to Latin charts suddenly realize what a hottie this guy is, swiveling his hips like that. Then comes the gay innuendos. Then comes the realization that outside of the stage, a celery stick is more sexual than Mr Martin. He’s not a Latin lover, he’s a possibly gay, New-Age yammering, bland singer who shakes his hips in that programmed hot way only on stage!

Today, he decides to start all over again by going back to basics. This means, people, he’s singing in Spanish again to embrace his old audience that made him a star in the first place. Almas Del Silencio is that album. Unfortunately, the album is filled with mostly uninspired music. The only thing “new” is Mr Martin singing in Spanish again.

First single Jaleo is pretty much an indication of how the entire album will sound like: mid-tempo tunes and ballads all sounding as they have been ground out from the homogenized sound machine. The songs are listenable, but they don’t exactly reach out and grab me. Let’s just hope Mr Martin’s soul searching will one day lead him to rediscover his erogenous zones and shake those bon-bons at me once more. Almas Del Silencio is just a well-packaged sort of blandness.

The bonus media CD that came with the CD offers a very brief tease of naked Ricky Martin skin, though. Just thought people might want to know.