Sony
1989
Cuts Both Ways
About This Album
Leveraging the runaway success of her previous album, Let It Loose, Gloria Estefan furthered her indulgence in spare, moody love ballads and club-ready dance-pop jams for Cuts Both Ways and scored herself another Top Ten album. The transformation of Gloria Estefan the lead singer of Miami Sound Machine to Gloria Estefan the pop star is complete here. While Let It Loose had been the first Miami Sound Machine album to co-bill Estefan (that is, "Gloria Estefan and Miami Sound Machine"), Cuts Both Ways is billed simply to the star herself. And it plays that way, too, with a heavy reliance on Gloria-spotlighting ballads -- roughly half the album, discounting the album-ending Spanish-language versions. Miami Sound Machine's patented Latin dance-lite style is sidelined a bit, for better and for worse. Sure, "Ay, Ay, I," "Say," "Oy Mi Canto," and "Get on Your Feet" are all club-ready with their big late-'80s synth-drum patterns, but only "Get on Your Feet" comes close to matching the majesty of past club hits like "Conga," "Rhythm Is Gonna Get You," and "1-2-3." And more tellingly, there aren't any straight pop songs here like "Bad Boy" or "Betcha Say That.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,7,8,10,11 and 12)

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