Those for whom this album is a first encounter with the music of the Dominican Republic are likely to wonder to what degree it reflects slapdash work on the part of its compilers, and to what degree it simply represents a slapdash musical culture. The tracks on this compilation are taken almost entirely from recordings made in the 1990s and early 2000s, and represent a weirdly disparate collection of musical styles:
Milly & Los Vecinos' "En Tus Manos" is built on a nice, brisk horn chart and a jaunty soca-like backbeat, while
Charytin's "Corazón de Acero" is all melodramatically hushed intensity and
Wilfrido Vargas' "El Africano" is all irritating babble. "La Morena," by Los Illegales, opens with a startlingly harsh techno intro before lapsing into a more conventional electro-Latin groove. In some cases, it seems that selections were just made carelessly, or perhaps even randomly --
Alexis and
Andy Andy sing "La Media Vuelta" and "Ya No Te Creo Nada," respectively, in flat, unpleasant voices that make you wonder why they were chosen for a collection like this. Elsewhere, a tendency toward schmaltz is taken to almost parodic levels: the generic love pop of
Angela Carrasco's "Alguien Como Tu" is a prime example of that tendency, and
the Santo Domingo Philharmonic's "La Bilirrubina" is a perfect example of what happens when you take a nice dance tune and apply French horns to it. The overall impression is of a musical culture in which no one is quite sure what he or she is doing -- which is certainly not the case.