Anything For You

Album

Invincible

Label

Epic records

Genre

-Pop

Duration

2:00

Composer(s)

Gloria M. Estefan

Entered Chart

Mar 12, 1988

Peak Date

May 14, 1988

Released

March 1988

Recorded

1987

Catalog #

Epic 34-07759

B-Side

(Spanish version)

This was Gloria Estefan's first American #1. The song is about the impossibility of letting go and the emotional upheaval of a dying relationship. The album Anything For You (Let it Loose in US) was the biggest selling album of the year in Holland, staying at #1 for 22 weeks. It was renamed "Anything For You" after the international success of the single of the same name. Estefan recorded three versions of this song: all English, all Spanish and Spanglish. >> By 1988, Estefan had been married to Miami Sound Machine founder Emilio Estefan Jr., who started the band under the moniker Miami Latin Boys, for 10 years. Fans wondered how the supposedly happily married singer could write such a heart-rending ballad about love gone wrong. She explained to Billboard in 1988: "I think that's where the artist uses his creative license. I might have experienced these feelings awhile back or maybe vicariously through somebody else, maybe friends of mine who have gone through a similar thing. I think the artist always writes from within, from the soul, and even if you didn't experience it yourself, you have to feel how would people in this situation feel, and how would they say it. I always try to write very conversationally, and think how would someone want to say it to someone else and then I try to make it more musical." The song was originally cut with just vocals and piano, but at the last minute the Estefans decided to change things up. With a four-day deadline, Miami Sound Machine's Jorge Casas (bassist) and Clay Ostwald (keyboardist) reworked the track and added guitar, bass, percussion, and horns to the mix.

Anything for you
Though you're not here
Since you said we're through
It seems like years
Time keeps draggin on and on
And forever's been and gone
Still I can't figure what went wrong

I'd still do anything for you
I'll play your game
You hurt me through and through
But you can have your way

I can pretend each time I see you
That I don't care and I don't need you
And though you'll never see me cryin'
You know inside I feel like dying
And I'd do anything for you
In spite of it all
I've learned so much from you
You made me strong
But don't you ever think that I don't love you
That for one minute I forgot you
But sometimes things don't work out right
And you just have to say goodbye

I hope you find somone to please you
Somone who'll care and never leave you
But if that someone ever hurts you
You just might need a friend to turn to

And I'd do anything for you
I'll give you up
If that's what I should do
To make you happy

I can pretend each time I see you
That I don't care and I don't need you
And though inside I feel like dying
You know you'll never see me crying

Don't you ever think that I don't love you
That for one minute I forgot you
But sometimes things don't work out right
And you just have to say goodbye