Search - Ricardo Arjona :: 12 Grandes Exitos

Mais que palavras bonitas

David A. Baer | Indianapolis, IN USA | 09/22/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This superb collection of the Guatemalan singer's hits does justice to a musician whose fiercely loyal fan base considers that he sings more than just pretty words. Arjona's presentation is often spare, which makes it all the more powerful when his orchestration pulls in the big guns ('Si el norte fuera el sur').



The lead track on this album and perhaps Arjona's signature tune is the suggestive 'Jesus É Verbo, Nao Sustantivo', a piece that worms its way indelibly into the soul not only for its melody but also for its audacious statement about Jesus.



Still, this reviewer believes that Arjona is at his best when he turns tu ironic, narrated ballads in the style of Eros Ramazotti ('Historia de Taxi'). When he does so, an almost Dickensian humor flavors his occasionally acidic observations about how life works--or fails to--in this unequal world.



Sometimes this narrative charm is turned towards the conquest of a reluctant woman ('Dime que no'), sometimes to a witty, piercing, and hilarious inspection of geopolitics ('Si el norte fuera el sur'). Always one is left--as is also the case with the music of Juan Luís Guerra--to wonder how such words come to a man made of this same flesh. The credits claim as the writer and one has no reason for disbelief. Just a bit of marveling.



There is at once a silky mobility and a masculine anchoring in Arjona's voice. This makes him an entirely pleasant listen, but one suspects that most of his fans--like this reviewer--return time and again as much for the words he sings as for the voice that sings them.



Arjona is a phenomenon in Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking America and for good reason. This 2001 collection of a dozen hits will need to be supplemented soon."