Te Acordaras de Mi, released in 1998, is where
Olga Tanon's discography begins to go astray. Here she leaves behind the consistently thrilling (and chart-topping)
tropical music she'd enjoyed for several albums, namely
Mujer de Fuego,
Siente el Amor..., and
Llevame Contigo. She'd done this once before, releasing an album of
Marco Antonio Solis songs,
Nuevos Senderos, in 1996. Instead of releasing another album of regional Mexican-styled music, however -- and a modest, enjoyable one at that, as
Nuevos Senderos had been -- she courts much broader appeal, fashioning herself as a
Latin pop diva a la
Thalia. The photogenic telenovela star is the logical point of connection, because
Te Acordaras de Mi features key contributions from hitmaker
Kike Santander, who had almost single-handedly made
Thalia's
Amor a la Mexicana the amazement that it was a year prior, in 1997. And, too,
Santander had worked with
Gloria Estefan before that, on
Abriendo Puertas in 1995. So
Tanon was clearly aiming far beyond her
tropical fan base with
Te Acordaras de Mi, aligning herself with a proven popsmith like
Santander, and the other telling sign is the absence of her former stable of songwriters:
Yaidelice Monrrozeau,
Rodolfo Barreras,
Raldy Vazquez, and
Gustavo Marquez, all of whom are sadly MIA. This was a bold move, for sure, and the result is scattershot. The three
Santander songs are fantastic, as expected: the album-opening
"Tu Amor" is a barnburner, one of
Tanon's all-time best dance songs, while
"Hielo y Fuego" and
"Un Hombre y una Mujer" are also excellent. Beyond the
Santander songs,
Te Acordaras de Mi veers all over, generally interspersing uptempo
dance-pop with romantic
ballads. The uptempo songs tend to be the highlights, most notably the fierce
"El Nino." The
ballads tend to be generic, on the other hand; the best is
"Escondidos," a
Cristian Castro duet. So consider this initial crossover venture a measured success:
Te Acordaras de Mi boasts a few really great hits, certainly, along with some good album tracks, yet it also includes a surprising number of misses -- not a particularly good omen, given how superlative and rock-solid
Tanon's last few albums had been. ~ Jason Birchmeier
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