For her first English album in eight years,
Gloria Estefan decided to freshen her sound a little bit by hiring head
Neptune Pharrell Williams as producer. Certainly,
Pharrell gives
Estefan a livelier setting than she’s accustomed to, yet his rhythms don’t breathe, they march along a straight line. As such,
Miss Little Havana seems a little earthbound, generating a real pulse when
Pharrell can cut loose with the arrangements, piling up the synths and layering the rhythms. These cuts, like “Make Me Say Yes,” are the ones that bring
Estefan closest to the night club, but if she’s tending toward Cuban rhythms or ballads, everything feels a little stiff and mannered, and certainly not like the colorful, endless party its singer and producer intended. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine