Say your band wants to win the musical hearts and minds of Central and South Americans, yet appeal to mainstream audiences in the United States?
The conventional wisdom would be to launch pop ballads at the local market and send some hot Latin rhythms south of the border.
The Miami Sound Machine has defied conventions, however, confounding music company mavens` advice by filling stadiums south of the Rio Grande on the strength of conventional pop tunes sung in Spanish and striking gold on the U.S. (and European) charts with songs sung in English but propelled by sizzling Latin percussion.
Adding to the irony is that ”Conga,” the chart-topping megahit that finally clued North American audiences that Miami Sound Machine was not Don Johnson`s personal boom box, was the most Latin-sounding tune the band ever recorded. And it came nearly a decade-and seven albums-after MSM ventured from its Miami base.
”We are considered a cross-over, but we were never really a crossover, because we never really were in Latin music,” explained singer Gloria Estefan. ”We were a pop Spanish band, but we never played salsa or reggae.” Estefan is MSM`s lead singer and main focal point, a charismatic pop diva whose voice can soar along with the band`s bright Latin flareups or coo sexy and intimate mainstream ballads. She`s also being touted as a star on the rise, having been promoted to lead billing: It`s now Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine.
The band had always incorporated some Latin percussion in its pop. And now that it has helped establish MSM worldwide, the group has claimed the Latin flavor as its trademark.
Estefan`s husband, Emilio Estefan Jr., formed the band more than a decade ago with two other Miami residents, drummer Kiki Garcia and bassist Marcos Avila. All three-plus Gloria, who joined a couple of years later-were born in Cuba and were brought to the U. S. by their parents after the Cuban revolution.
Originally called the Miami Latin Boys, the band was renamed after the addition of Gloria, who first encountered the boys at a friend`s wedding. At that point, she had sung only for herself and at school talent shows.
”I was a little shy, I guess,” she says.
At the wedding, Gloria`s friends urged her to sing a tune with the band, which she did. The following week, Emilio was on the phone, asking her to join the group. Eventually, Gloria and Emilio were married.
Gloria, who has a psychology degree from the Univeristy of Miami, never expected to become a professional singer.
For someone now so associated with Latin music, Gloria Estefan`s musical tastes run incongruously to middle-of-the-road American pop: Johnny Mathis, Diana Ross, Barbra Streisand, Gino Vanelli.
But it was that mainstream brand of pop that initially established the band, first with a couple of bilingual albums for a local Miami label, then with five more, all in Spanish, recorded for CBS` international division and marketed specifically for Latin and South American audiences. There the Miami Sound Machine essentially became superstars, particularly in Guatemala, Ecuador and Panama.
The band finally broke from both its mainstream formula and its market pigeonhole in 1984 with ”Dr. Beat,” a Latin-flavored dance tune. It was a big hit in Europe as well as in Central and South America, and it started attracting some U.S. listeners to the group as well.
”Conga” was even hotter, tying scorching Afro-Cuban rhythms together with pop hooks and simplistic, English lyrics, blasting to the top of the charts in Europe, then America, and carrying the album ”Primitive Love” with it and, in the process, spinning off two more top 10 singles: ”Bad Boy” and a ballad, ”Words Get in the Way.”
Estefan expects even bigger things from MSM`s latest album, ”Let It Loose,” whose first single, ”Rhythm Is Gonna Get You” has already spent 16 weeks on the Billboard charts.
The Latin-pop mix is more prominent on ”Let It Loose,” which is much more confident than its predecessors and benefits from more sophisticated production. The arrangements are tighter and more purposeful, especially livening up the ballads, which sometimes in the past were no better than second-rate easy-listening material.
The band plays with a more confident swagger as well, perhaps reflecting the changes since ”Primitive Love.” Emilio Estefan, who started out playing accordion, then switched to percussion, has quit performing with the band to concentrate on production work and take care of the couple`s 7-year-old son while the band is on the road. Original member Avila also has left the band, to operate a talent agency and restaurant in Miami.
At the same time, the band`s permanent lineup has been augmented with the additions of saxophonist Ed Calle, guitarist John Defaria, bassist George Casas and keyboardist Clay Ostwald.
Meanwhile, the Miami Sound Machine has backed into a significant musical niche, dishing its Latin pop out of the Miami melting pot and maybe spurring a revival of the Latin dance craze that swept the country in the `50s.
”Now that we`ve crossed over and we are American pop artists, we`ll always keep the pop in,” Estefan said. ”We`ll never go completely Latin. But we will definitely not take the Latin out, either.”
