Over the summer, all of us at the NHQ became obsessed with Charo, née María Rosario Pilar Martínez Molina Moquiere de les Esperades Santa Ana Romanguera y de la Najosa Rasten. “DANTHE… Jooth ay leetle beet klohther!” was on everybody’s lips, and all of our eyes on her glorious tits. Reading her Wikipedia article was a revelation in and of itself, but YouTubing her rarer appearances made her all the more alluring.

Not only was Charo NOT just the blonde bimbo of whom I had only the vaguest childhood recollections (Hollywood Squares), she was a musical prodigy whose career began when she was “discovered” by Xavier Cugat, that irresistible Spanish bandleader whose work was most recently re-popularized by Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar Wai in films such as 2046, In The Mood for Love, and Days of Being Wild. After watching the next video, you too will realize why we find the winner of the award for Cugat’s most vivacious fourth wife (she was just 15 when he married her at age 66) equally irresistible (she’s the first guest, so don’t skip ahead):

WOW now that’s some RAW TALENT! Ain’t no way around it. No true space cadet could ever have the mellifluous motor control and pure power of expression to which we sensual creatures are all beholden. Likewise take note of one of Colombian pop princess Shakira’s earlier appearances in American-made media.

Besides the obvious similarities of Spanish and the Sex Appeal, in these videos, both Shakira and Charo are also presented (are they presenting themselves?) in ways that highlight their talents as musicians: both women are wielding guitars (Charo throughout, Shakira mostly towards the end). The fact that both are singing in their native tongue is not to be overlooked; these songs were originally written in Spanish, and are therefore inevitably more poetic than what would later pass as popular music. For both women, this would mean singing English-language songs whose only merits are the unexpected level of amusement one derives from appreciating their absurd vapidity. See below:

Not only is the music less musical (I’d like to see someone try and argue Shakira’s coquettish wolf howl as superior to her robust natural singing voice), but their visual presentation is much more contrived and hyper-sexualized, and much less unique to the performers themselves. Charo was a classically trained Spanish guitarist and flamenco dancer, as evidenced by only her earliest televised appearances. You would never know, though, after seeing her jiggle and giggle her way through The Loveboat theme. Likewise, Shakira is a former musical prodigy and accomplished multi-instrumentalist, capable of expressing so much more than one might imagine after watching her writhe and thrust her way around a cage (a life-sized geode, a crowded club, etc.) with…

…on her lips. Also capable of processing complex intellectual activities, such as studying history at UCLA, or speaking at Oxford University about her work as an educator and philanthropist. But you might not notice, what with all that other stuff coming out of her mouth on the radio and in her videos. The same could be said of Charo.

However, it wouldn’t be fair to find fault with either of these women for merely riding the great [single] white [male] wave of convention (cowabunga, dude!) to stardom… Rather, we make and appreciate the distinction between the before and after, taking special care to celebrate what once was and is no longer. What once was María Rosario Pilar Martínez Molina Moquiere de les Esperades Santa Ana Romanguera y de la Najosa Rasten is now just “Cuchi-Cuchi.” In the beginning, there was Shakira. In the end, there was Charo. What does it matter? It’s all the same to us if it’s all the same to them.