5th October, 1996
It's the fall of 1996, and the inevitability of Enrique Iglesias' fourth number one in the space of a year is matched only by the tidal swell and crash of the music behind his youthfully strained voice. He's now matched Selena and Jon Secada for highest amount of number ones off of one album — like Secada, it's his debut; unlike either Secada or Selena, he will go on having number ones for decades.
"No Llores Por Mí" means "don't cry for me," and while I'm not certain the Evita reference is intentional (the Madonna movie version was not yet in theaters, and the song had been written some time earlier), this recording shares Lloyd-Weber's fondness for big obvious dramatics — that power-ballad guitar solo! — and fatal lack of any actual dynamics; it's just the same chord sequence in the same tempo, pounded over and over again.
Iglesias is almost a cipher on the song, attempting Luis Miguel-style intimacy and power but achieving neither, larding on extra grit in order make up for his thin, kind of whiny voice. I say this as an Enrique Iglesias fan; but he did not spring forth fully-formed, only gradually working his way into the louche caricature of Latin sexiness he's inhabited for the last decade. It'll be a while before we get there.
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