Miami Sound Machine – Dr. Beat
#quotefromthe80s
I just don't know, don't know
How I'm gonna deal with you
I just don't know, don't know
Won't you help me, Dr. Beat?
#MiamiSoundMachine #GloriaEstefan #DrBeat
We all were sick of music, in the 80s. Music was really beautiful and there was a lot of creativity in many parts of the world, which could then give life to absolute masterpieces and great stars. We know, in the 80s so many things happened by chance. And this story also begins with an almost casual encounter, at the rehearsal of a choir singing in a church. We are in Miami, but this is not an American story. In fact it is a Cuban story, because the protagonists were all born in Cuba, but we are in 1975, and following the Cuban revolution the protagonists are now refugees in Miami.
At the rehearsal of this choir the young Gloria, who was with her cousin Mercedes, meets Emilio, who plays in a group with some relatives and some friends. The group is called Miami Latin Boys, and they play mostly at Cuban parties and weddings. Gloria and Emilio start dating, and a short time later they find themselves at a Cuban wedding where the Miami Latin Boys animate the party. At a certain point, however, Emilio invites two of the guests, Gloria and “Merci” to join the musical group. Gloria and Merci introduce themselves improvising Cuban songs with so much energy and singing so well, that Emilio asks them to join the group permanently.
Gloria is a bit hesitant, because she is attending university, so she will only be able to sing with the band on weekends. Emilio has no doubts: it will be a success, and to celebrate this exceptional moment he changes the name of the group, which since then will be called Miami Sound Machine. The following year then, Emilio Estefan and Gloria will get married, and since then in the music world she will bring the name of her husband, Gloria Estefan.
Miami Sound Machine’s career takes off in the early 1980s, but they are somewhat limited by singing in Spanish, which confines them a bit to the Florida area and the southern States in general. In 1984, however, they decide to change direction, and record their first album in English, Eyes Of Innocence. They had recorded seven albums up to that point, all in Spanish. The release of the album is scheduled for September, but in the first days of August the first single comes out, and obviously it’s a very important test, because it’s the first song by Miami Sound Machine in English.
Dr. Beat is a resounding success. Not only in the United States, but also in England, in many other European countries, in South Africa and in Australia. This song has it all: unstoppable rhythm, the fantastic voice of Gloria, the sounds and atmospheres of Cuban orchestras, and of course the electronics of the 80s. And we all get music sick like Gloria in the song! The song is in fact very simple: Gloria asks Dr. Beat for help because she can no longer control her body when she hears the music: her feet start to move, and she is forced to dance.
The video is simple but really enjoyable. It begins with a desperate scene: on the roof of a skyscraper a woman is dancing relentlessly, risking to fall. That’s why Dr. Beat’s ambulance is called. The skyscraper was not chosen by chance: it is the Bacardi Building in Miami, a symbolic place not only because all the rum from Cuba arrived there, but also because Emilio Estefan and also Kiki Garcia, drummer of Miami Sound Machine, author and lyricist of the song, had worked there.
Kiki Garcia is also the guy who plays Dr. Beat, and arrives with his unlikely assistant nurses. As they take Gloria to the hospital, the crowd begins to dance too, revealing notable dancers.
Gloria arrives in a somewhat unlikely hospital, populated by strange characters, a mix between Young Frankenstein and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Eventually, after Dr. Beat has auscultated Gloria (on the ankle, of course), he takes her to the operating room, where he manages to solve the problem, extracting one of the boombox of the 80s from her body and cutting the power wire that connected it to Gloria’s body.
After Dr. Beat, the career of Miami Sound Machine and especially of Gloria Estefan will no longer be what it was before. The Spanish language was establishing as a second language of pop. If we think, the impact that Gloria and Miami Sound Machine had on music is incalculable, because they really opened a genre of Latin pop ready for the rest of the world, which over the years will see the stars of Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, Ricky Martin and many others come up, who should say a tiny thank you to the 80s and to Gloria and Emilio Estefan! In a world of so many failed marriages, it’s nice to see that Gloria and Emilio are still one beautiful family. And Gloria recently recalled how Emilio was her first and only boyfriend. All was really written in destiny!!!
Miami Sound Machine and Gloria Estefan on Wikipedia
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