For anyone hurting for more super-aggressive reggaeton, with straight-down-the-center beats and MCs that sound as though they're about 30 seconds from a fist fight,
Eliel has a disc of better than 20 tracks that will fit the bill. Having served as a beat-maker for some of reggaeton's best-known artists,
Eliel stands beside
Noriega and
Luny Tunes as one of the most in-demand producers on the scene.
El Que Habla con las Manos is his first disc as the focal point. He Who Speaks with His Hands is joined by rappers
Don Omar,
Baby Ranks, Hector "El Bambino," and Glory, to name a few. As a pioneer in the style,
Eliel was one of the first and finest producers to meld Jamaican dancehall rhythms and Latin American elements with machine gun Spanish-language hip-hop vocals. Perhaps because
Eliel turned knobs behind some of the genre's biggest hits, his sound and approach feel familiar. So much so that there are only a few standout tunes on the record, like "La Popola" and the hit single "Ronca." The other 19 tracks tend to run together into a nondescript, formulaic mishmash. However, with wild success like holding a place in the Top Three on several of Billboard's Latin and reggae charts, don't fix what's not broken. ~ Evan C. Gutierrez