Gloria Trevi prepares to show fans another side of her

Gloria Trevi’s life could be a telenovela. Wait, she already starred in one. Or a reality show. Hold up, she already had her own. Or a biopic. You guessed it, the movie already came out this year.

The larger-than-life singing star known as the “Mexican Madonna” has been making a splash on stages and screens for the past 25 years. The singer, who was once dubbed the “Supreme Diva of Mexican Pop,” has sold more than 20 million albums worldwide and written more than 200 songs. But her career has not been without controversy and comebacks, which have all come under the public’s watchful eye.

So now, at 47, you might think the superstar was all out of surprises. But you’d be wrong. Because the singer is set to show a whole new side of herself with her new album, “El Amor,” coming out Aug. 21. For the project Trevi sang half the songs from the perspective of a man and half from the perspective of a woman. She also created the character of “Mr. Trevi,” her idealized man, complete with suit and top hat.

“Well, I was singing with some friends, drinking some tequila and having a good evening. I was a little sad in that moment, because my husband was so ‘apático,’ didn’t say what he was feeling at the time,” Trevi said in a phone interview from her home in Texas. “Then I heard a song from Roberto Carlos. As he was singing, I was feeling, ‘I want that my man says that to me.’ So in that moment, I started to create Mr. Trevi. I wanted to sing the music that says the way that I want to be loved. And then to answer those songs with the way that I loved like a woman.”

Trevi debuted Mr. Trevi with a video for the first single off her new album, a cover of Carlos’ “Como yo te amo,” in June. Her tour for the new album swings into the Gallo Center for the Arts on Aug. 23, one of only three California dates she has planned.

The video for “Como yo te amo” (or “How I Love You”) features Trevi with slicked-back hair in shiny menswear. Trevi said she is overwhelmed by the response so far.

“I am so happy. It is exciting, in Mexico and Central America the single is going up very fast and the people they come. The people are so nice,” she said. “I was worried about my fans, they are used to hearing the music I write. So as a composer I was a little worried if they were disappointed or something like that. But they were so happy, they say, ‘I love the way you sing that song.’ I tried to do it with a lot of passion when I was recording this song.”

Trevi said the recording of the album came when she was going through a “very hard moment” with her husband, attorney Armando Gomez. So if you hear extra emotion in her songs, she said it’s real.

“I was recording the album with a lot of feeling. When I sang the song ‘The Love Must Die,’ I was really crying in the moment that I was recording that song. That was a special moment,” she said.

But, don’t worry, the album also acted as a sort of therapy session for their relationship, she said.

“I made Mr. Trevi from my fantasy when I was recording this album. I made my perfect man,” she said. “So my husband he sees that man, and he thought, ‘This man is gonna take my wife.’ Now I am happy with my husband again. Really, I am very happy with the result of this album a lot.”

That kind of frank honesty has been a hallmark of Trevi’s career. In 1989 she burst onto the scene as a rebel with a bundle of wild hair and brash songs. She has No. 1 Latin hits with songs like “Dr. Psiquiatra” (“Dr. Psychiatrist”), “Pelo suelto” (“Hair Down”), “La papa sin catsup” (“Potato without ketchup”) and “Todos me mira” (“All Eyes on Me”). But more than just being provocative, Trevi was often also political. She sang about social issues like drugs and prostitution as well as the government and religion.

But then in the late 1990s her career almost completely derailed after she became ensnared in a sex scandal and criminal allegations. She and her manager and then-boyfriend Sergio Andrade, who discovered her at age 16, were arrested in 2000 and accused of sexually abusing underage girls. Trevi spent four years and eight months in prison – during which she gave birth to a son – before being acquitted in 2004 by a Mexican court for lack of evidence. In 2005 Andrade was found guilty on charges of rape, kidnapping and corruption of minors in a Mexican court.

Since then Trevi has rebuilt her career. She has released four studio albums, including the No. 1 albums “Cómo Nace El Universo” and “Gloria.” She starred in the telenovela “Libre para amart” (“Free for Love”) in 2013. Last year she starred in her own reality series, “A Toda Gloria” (“In All Glory”), on NBC Universal’s Mun2. And earlier this year a biopic about her tumultuous life, titled “Gloria,” was released.

Trevi is particularly excited about her upcoming album, “El Amor,” which she worked on with producer Humberto Gatica. He has worked with everyone from Andrea Bocelli to Barbra Streisand, Michael Bublé and – yes – even Madonna.

“He makes music that crosses the generations. What he did was get a big orchestra with the best working musicians in L.A. (for the record),” Trevi said. “The sound is incredible. He makes incredible work. I love this album and am really happy with this. I’m ready to start the tour.”

Trevi is bringing some of that big sound out on the road with her as well. Her touring band includes strings, horns and swells to eight depending on the venue.

Still, the singer is more than happy to sample the album’s stripped-down sound to you over the phone. Her excitement about her new music comes through each verse.

“What I sing as a man is something like, ‘I want to kiss you to wake up. I want to be your lipstick.’ It’s such a wonderful song, very romantic. Then the answer to that song is a woman who says, ‘The little things that I have, they are the big things that make me happy.’ That’s the answer to a woman and a man.”

This story was originally published August 12, 2015 at 4:25 PM with the headline "Gloria Trevi prepares to show fans another side of her."