Welcome to “Remember This Banger?” – a sequence wherein we’ll periodically revisit a few of Latin music’s most enduring and beloved songs.
Thalía’s ’90s hitThat’s goodis a Juan Gabriel-penned, ska-infused exploration of a pop icon’s dance with holiness and sin.
Decorated with a shiny, beveled patent corset Velma Kelly bobThalía in full dom mode sensually prowls the display screen in a dripping moist industrial warehouse, set to the sunshine, brassy ska beat of the 1996 single “Gracias a Dios.”
He straddles a blindfolded man tied to a chair, then shaves his face with a straight razor, which the singer then wields to tear off his shirt, exposing his chiseled pecs. Mistress Thalía rests her cheek on her man’s chest whereas the candy trill of her voice expresses absolute devotion. Suddenly she sprays him with a fireplace hose: the legal guidelines of physics don’t apply in Thalía’s intercourse jail.
The Mexican star has simply launched an album of latest songs.
(Reform Agency)
“Gracias a Dios” marks the fifth single from the Mexican pop icon’s fourth album, ”In ecstasy.” The banger, written by El Divo de Juárez, adopted a few of Thalía’s largest hits, together with “Piel Morena,” “Maria la del Barrio” and “Sangre,” spending 5 weeks on Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart , peaking at quantity 26 and peaking at quantity eight on the Latin Pop Airplay chart. It was an enormous success in Latin America, garnering radio performs on stations catering to the señora market.
I spent numerous Sundays cleansing with the scent of Suavitel wafting by means of our home and the music blaring from my mom’s stereo, all the time set to her favourite station, Radio Latina of Tijuana (104.5 FM). For me, a ska-loving punk teenager who blasted Madness, Specials and, in fact, Sublime within the bed room, “Gracias a Dios” hit the Venn diagram of popular culture that formed me. Worlds collided and he dominated.
Thalía was removed from a beginner on the scene when the music turned a success, having been cast from childhood within the Mexican leisure business below the nation’s intense star system with the help of a robust household earlier than being topped Queen of Latin Pop.
The multi-talented 53-year-old was born Ariadna Thalía Sodi Miranda in Mexico City, the youngest of 5 daughters born in criminologist and scientist Ernesto Sodi Pallareswho died when she was 6, and Yolanda Miranda Mange, a single mother turned public relations govt. Through her father, Thalía was born into one among Mexico’s most outstanding and rich households, the Sodi household, who initially immigrated from Florence, Italy, to Oaxaca within the nineteenth century and shortly after turned entrenched in politics, occupying authorities positions below the dictatorship. by Porfirio Diaz.
Over the generations, members of the Sodi household have remained energetic in politics, journalism, legislation and academia. In the Seventies they started to construct an leisure dynasty when Laura Zapata, Thalía’s sister from Miranda Mange’s first marriage, started appearing, starring within the 1974 telenovela “Mundo de Juguete,” paving the best way for her sister to affix the business and later their granddaughter, Camila Sodi. Thalía obtained the complete boot camp remedy as a toddler, first showing on display screen in a mushy drink business when she was one, coaching and performing tirelessly in dance. singing and appearing. She joined the children’s pop group Din-Din on the age of 9.
By the time “Thank God” hit radio throughout Latin America, she was already a world famous person, having carried out within the pop group Timbiriche alongside future Latin superstars Paulina Rubio, Erik Rubín and Benny Ibarra. His rise contains three profitable solo albums and appearing in telenovelas, together with “Quinceañera,” “Luz y Sombra” and his career-defining Marías trilogy – “Maria Mercedes,” “Marimar” AND “Maria from the neighborhood“- all by 11pm.
In the next many years, Thalía’s life noticed dramatic turns in telenovelas, together with kidnapping of two sisters and a relationship that lasted years along with his supervisor, additionally the son of a former president of Mexico, it began at 17 – he was 38. Then there was the story of have your ribs removed for aesthetic functions, however the singer appeared to dispel these rumors with a Post on Instagram in 2014. Six years later, she married music govt Tommy Mottola in a lavish December wedding ceremony in New York — her fortunately ever after.
While initially “Gracias a Dios” it was written by Gabriel and performed as a ballad for his 1989 telenovela “Luz y Sombra”, it was reproduced and remixed for “En Éxtasis”. The new model emerged as a full of life, ska-tinged pop beat, full with background singers harmonizing “wah-yo wah-yo wah-ya,” requiring some gentle teasing. The music sounds just like the Latin religious sister of “The Stars Are Blind” by Paris Hilton” (one other standout, in my view) or Gwen Stefani’s work each as a solo artist and with No Doubt.
The music video, directed by Benny Corralit repositions the narrative of the music itself. Through her signature girlish squeals and Marilyn-like whispered cadence, Thalía, because the protagonist of her video, sings of her gratitude to the love in her life – a love she has all the time dreamed of and is so grateful to God for ensuring they have been born in the identical century. The music was launched throughout her time because the romantic lead in 1995’s “María la del Barrio” with co-star Fernando Colunga, including gas to the music’s fireplace.
But with the video, Corral and Thalía flip that emphatic appreciation for God-sent love right into a hymn to all-consuming obsession. Suddenly, it is the form of love that makes you wish to, say, put on a FABULOUS wig and corset, kidnap a person in a moist warehouse and punish him sensually. This is the road Thalía has adopted all through her profession, mixing the harmless with the horny, establishing her model of cheeky flirtatiousness.
He constructed a charismatic persona and angelic leads in cleaning soap opera roles, radiating an attractive youngster with a understanding wink. But by means of music and imagery, Thalía has deliberately altered that picture, taking the chance to not solely recast herself as a girl who explores and embraces her sexual facet, however, extra importantly, a girl who takes her personal choices. In a 2023 Billboard interviewshe recalled: “When I went solo, I used to be 100% concerned in my movies, within the combine, within the composition. Remember, I lived for a few years below the regime of cleaning soap operas: “Stay right here, keep there.” I used to be all the best way right here with directions.”
The indisputable fact that “Gracias a Dios” invokes the Lord himself, thanking him for what seems to be a sexual awakening on this planet of domination, as seen within the video, exhibits a propensity for provocation towards a Catholic tradition not too completely different from one other artist of her period – Madonna, whose type, controversial spiritual imagery and “Express yourself” video really feel your self mirrored right here within the humid industrial setting.
It’s a transfer nicely made by a younger artist who desires to be taken severely as an grownup. Madonna laid the groundwork for a lot of, embracing intercourse as a vital a part of her artwork as a result of it’s a vital a part of her humanity, influencing feminine artists around the globe, together with Thalía, to valorize their picture as each a revolutionary software and a maneuver of selling on this planet of cinema. sexually charged culture of the 90s. Thalía even tailored Madonna’s cone bra look by rocking it welded metal bras to support the taps, small guitars and different objects, highlighting his penchant for the mischievous.
“Thank God” wasn’t the icon’s first foray into the sexually express. The 1990 pop-rock single “Un Pacto Entre Los Dos” from his self-titled debut album sparked controversy for its sadomasochistic lyrics: “Bite him/damage him/punish him/share his ardour.”
“Since my first album, I’ve all the time been like this: that voice of a girl who mentioned very unusual issues that different girls did not say,” the entertainer told Forbes in 2020. “I used to be speaking about sexuality, sexuality, sexuality, then my first album, and even my first solo single, have been banned on the radio. They say it was a form of “sadomasochism” as a result of I used to be all the time express, obtainable and sexual. And now that is what’s in vogue, however again then it was to precise the sensation of all the women.”
He continued to make intercourse an integral a part of his catalog with songs like his ode to being seduced in Mexico “Mexican love” and the jam of exoticism “Brown leather“, every of which results in some uncomfortable interviews with male TV hosts. Even “Gracias a Dios”, as anticipated, aroused some consideration from the conservative lots, however this didn’t forestall it from turning into successful and get an English version. (It’s not pretty much as good.)
In the 1996 interview with Cristina Saraleguithe discuss present host requested Thalía if maybe she had exaggerated with the video, to which the singer replied that she wished to put on a glance that nobody had ever seen on her, one thing “stronger” and extra “aggressive”, particularly after having made essentially the most healthful “María” trilogies.
“They see me as candy or because the woman who suffers or the lady who cries, so I wished to do one thing completely different,” she defined with a smile. “Change it and it labored, proper? It had a really robust impression.”
But she additionally talked about feeling like there are two Thalías: the actress who embraces Cinderella roles, overcoming poverty and struggling to discover a pleased ending, and the singer who desires to push boundaries. Blurring these inflexible edges took its toll on ladies like me who have been taught to repress themselves right into a suffocating ideally suited of what it meant to be good. Delivering that message with confidence, a way of self, and a bit old style flirting, Thalía has constructed a life and profession that’s true to her and has earned world admiration whereas doing so.
Latin America has all the time struggled with nuance with regards to girls and celebrities, boxing them in as Madonnas or whores, and being each tickled and scandalized by girls’s selections as they cross these incorrect, misogynistic traces. Thalía fought towards this, proving that angels could be horny, girls can embody every little thing, and that it isn’t solely okay, however could be celebrated. Hell, it may be enjoyable! And with “Gracias a Dios” we’ve an anthem that challenges that very dichotomy and opens up the likelihood for girls to dwell exterior these boundaries.
