Roadtrippin’ in Brazil: 10 Albums you, probably, haven’t heard before but you should
Being one of the biggest countries in the world, both in population and size, Brazil itself can be described as a synthesis of the modern world. From the indigenous-european first years of the colony, to the afro-brazilian culture and the later european (italians, germans and slavs) and arabic (syro-lebanese) migration. Brazil can not be described as only a one-way culture. The black, white, levantine and native cultures all blend together to form a different spin, nor european nor african, but brazilian. Music in Brazil started in the early days of the colony, with the the catholic priests teaching the native and black slaves the fundamentals of the christian baroque choir. Later in the church festivities the christian choirs would make contact with the african percussion, dances and the baroque guitar that eventually created the brazilian viola caipira (country viola) a ten string instrument with 5 courses, tuned in Open tunnings, that together with the nylon acoustic guitar were the two biggest instruments in early brazilian music. With The time passing by, brazilian music was opening itself to the world. What can be widely seen in the mid to late 60’s with the Beatles and the british invasion, starting a huge clash in Brazil, those who standed with the old folk ways of the Nylon guitar and the newcomers that embodied the “imperialistic” electric guitar in their own sounding. What brought in 1967 the “March Against the Electric Guitar” with the leadership of Elis Regina, one of the brazilian biggest stars at the time.
From 1964 to 1985 brazilians were ruled by a dictatorship, the presidents were selected in minor elections and were all members of the military, the oposition were persecuted and the music such other arts and colleges, since 1968, censured. This sad scenario indeed created one of the prettiest lyrics in Brazil. Some artists went all in and defied the military, such as Geraldo Vandré, exiled to Chile and later to France for his lyrics against the goverment. Others like Chico Buarque started writing against the goverment but in subjective ways, to evade the censorship. But truth is, the dictatorship didn’t wanted people defying her. And so even Chico Buarque would later be exiled to Italy. With the end of the military goverment, artists felt free to express themselves again, where the media also encouraged them to do it. So, here are some of the best of the least well known from south to north, white or black, always brazilian:
10. Geraldo Vandré — Canto Geral (1967)
The tenth album is a cult classic by one of the brazilian long forgotten legends. Geraldo Vandré had some of the prettiest music in brazilian Folk music. During the dictatorship he was one of the few that openly spoke against the military in songs such Terra Plana present in this album, Geraldo speaks about being from a “Flat Earth” were people want him to speak about the beutiful brazil, to forget about the poverty and that people want to sing and dance. What shocks the most is that, 57 years later, we have still to write songs against “flat earthers”. Vandré is a pure folk brazilian singer-songwriter, he can stand toe to toe with the greats such as Pete Seeger when were talking about criticism and Bob Dylan in prettiness in writing.
While we are still talking about his lyrical and vocal performance, Vandré is a baritone singer where his deep voice mates with his emotional lyrics. His writing will almost always focus in few topics: Social injustice, love, poverty, his own sadness with the goverment and the union of the people of brazil. Those lyrics exiled the artist fearing for his life. His hit song Pra não dizer que não falei das flores was considered communist, for,with other reasons, “instigating people to think”, by the leaders of ARENA, the military party. In this album, some of the songs were we can see his deep meanings are the already cited Terra Plana, De Serra De Terra e Mar, Ventania, Guerrilheira and O Plantador.
Vandré considered himself a nacionalist, and in songs such O Plantador he spoke openly about the countryside reality, where few people had a lot of land, and some could barely make enough to eat but besides working all day, they were considered lower class citizens for being poor, and mostly non-white. In other songs such Ventania we see his more passionate side: “ M’lady, M’lord / let me speak with clarity / don’t deny me this hour / your heat, your attention / with this song i bring you now / That speak about our country/…/I walked trough the whole world / trying to find / somewhere where i could feel happy/ were i could change / but life wont change / only by changing places”. This song speaks on introspective levels when you think that Vandré had to return to Brazil in 1973 because, with the exile, he developed depression and gave up his musical career. He didn’t wanted to change places, he wanted to change people.
On the instrumental side of the record, what can be noted is the presence of Hermeto Pascoal (Airto Moreira and Miles Davis), one the brazilian all time greats musicians. Being from the Northeast Brazil, Vandré in this album focus on the typical brazilian music of the region, instruments like the Viola Caipira, Nylon Guitar and the Triangle are all around this album. His songs also use a lot of the brazilian “scales”, or the minor scale, present all around brazilian music, the minor scale, mainly the Aeolian scale, which bring the strong background to Vandré’s deep voice and lyrics.
09. Chico Science & Nação Zumbi — Da Lama Ao Caos (1994)
While we are still on the heat of brazilian Northeastern music, here’s the pernanbucans of Nação Zumbi. The groups was formed around the late 80’s and early 90’s by two distinct groups. The first being a Post-Punk Band called Loustal and the members of a Olodum (a “samba-reggae” Afro-Brazilian percussion genre) group called Lamento Negro. This album was highly influential on Sepultura’s Roots and in early Soulfly records. Nação Zumbi itself is hard to describe in a simple genre, the band describe the sound as Manguebeat, mangue being Mangrove in portuguese in reference to the Recife region where the band is from. Da Lama Ao Caos is the debut album of the group, that only released two albums with the original singer Chico Science before his tragic early loss, the other being Afrociberdelia in 1996.
Chico is heavy influenced by Isaac Asimov, so his lyrics are fueled with futuristic references where he also references the “baroque Brazil” from the past, as can be seen in “Rios, Pontes e Overdrives” (Rivers, bridges and Overdrives) and in Computadores fazem arte (Computers make art) where the chorus is “Computers make art / artists make money”. Beside the influence of the “Afro-futurism” and Asimov, Chico Science is also known for political lyrical content, the first song of the album starts with the following lines: “To Modernize the past / is a musical evolution / Where are the notes previously here? / I don’t need them / Its enough to everything sounding right to your ears / The Fear is the origin of the evil / The coletive man feels the need of fighting / The pride, arrogance, glory / fill the dominion of imaginance / They are demons, destroying the brave power of humanity/ Viva Zapata! Viva Sandino! Viva Antonio Conselheiro / All The Black Panthers, Lampião His own image and Likeness / I’m sure, they all sang one day”.
Some other political lyrics are A praieira about the Praieira Revolt from the group home state of Pernanbuco, one of the first brazilian Enlighted moviments of the XIX century, the song is rightly ambiguous, in first touch you think he’s talking about dancing and going to the beach before lunch (Praia is portuguese to beach, so praieros, the revolucionaries from Pernanbuco were the Beach-like people, the litoral of that state being super populated the revolt was centralized in the coastal town of Recife). And the song A Cidade (The Town) Chico write about the ways of the modern metropoles “There are always some with more / And some with less / The town dont stop / The town grows / The Upper (reference to the upper classes) keeps climbing / The Lower (reference to worker classes) keep falling”.
On the instrumental side of the album, the record is a weirdly amazing mix of Northeastern folk music, triangles and such, with american funk, afro-brazilian music, groove metal, punk rock and psychedelic music. The band lead guitarrist Lúcio Maia is considered one of Brazil’s all time great guitarrists, blending heavy distortion lead riffs with funky clean rythms. The basslines are deep and complemented by the heavy percussions the group use. The drum keep a “northeastern folk” with some elements of american funk music. In paper, Nação Zumbi would make a really strange interaction of a 8-man band, but in reality, the heavy sounding of the Post-punk band complete perfectly the suffering sound of the percussion lead brazilian black Lamento Negro music.
08. Almir Sater — Instrumental (1985)
Almir Sater in this record, for non-brazilian readers, can be easily described as “Experimental Country”. Born in the brazilian rural-western state of Mato Grosso, he went to Rio De Janeiro do study Law. Soon after, he gave up his studies to become a full time musician. What marks the most in his style is the playing of the brazilian viola, by 1985, a instrument largely marginalized in the main towns of Brazil, considered a instrument of “old people”, the sertanejo (Brazilian “country”) was a music of the past, the singers sang in a mostly comical way for the “new born”, in 1985 music in brazil was mostly The Smiths or new wave influenced, some bands dressing up or playing exactly like them. So, for much people there was no space for “old time Brazil”.
This record, apart from many others prove this a lie, Almir Sater, raised listening to bands like Led Zepelin incorporated the heavy-blues rock of his likening to the brazilian sertanejo, his is considered for many the all time great in the instrument, this original style spawned his third album, here we could really listen closely for his groundbreaking style in full tone for the first time. Instrumental is a concept, not only music, we can clearly listen to the influences trough the album such the blues in the first song Corumbá and Benzinho the later also have a virtuoso style for the last part, bluegrass and country for Capim Azul(this song is literaly called Bluegrass in portuguese), some The Who influenced bridges in Luzeiro, violins for Doma and Ravi Shankar influenced style sitar in É de Minas Pra Riba.
The impact of Almir Sater made Sertanejo popular once again in Brazil, nowdays the genre being “industrialized” and sold as bubblegum pop in some truth without any assemblence with Sater or the earlier 40’s and 50’s poor man rural music of the original Sertanejo. The fact he made sertanejo famous once again almost alone prove the influence of this artist in Brazil, where Almir played a huge impact for people from the eastern brazil, mainly the metropoles living people to buy once again the most brazilian of the instruments, the brazilian viola. He is one of the most low key virtuosos in Brazil, while the same time paying a huge influence in brazilian music.
07. Sérgio Sampaio — Eu quero é Botar Meu Bloco Na Rua
One of the best examples in brazilian music of the Early 70’s late psychedelic and proto-progressive music, Sérgio’s debut solo album is another of the brazilian forgotten gems, his mix of Samba, soul and psychedelic music make this album a unique masterpiece. His lyrics are short stories, some that can be traced back to his own life, about other people and others in a abstractic way about people in a whole. Sérgio was signed to the Phillips Label, and his first apparence was with Sociedade da Grã-Ordem Kavernista Apresenta Sessão das 10 a conceptual psychedelic group assembled by the brazilian legend, at the time only record producer, Raul Seixas, which is referenced in Sérgio’s solo in the song “Raulzito” (the short Raul was known for).
This album is best known for the song that gave this album his name, Eu quero botar meu bloco na Rua is besides the heavy psychedelic production of the album a very simplistic song with percussions and acoustic guitars. Was a song that Sérgio played for the first time at the Globo’s televisioned music festival of 1972. A concept widely popular in brazil in the 60’s and 70’s for newcomers to released their first songs, before the recording or release of their first albums. Besides not wining the festival (Those festivals were competitions, where the best lyricist, best music, etc. were crowned the best of the year). Eu quero botar meu bloco na Rua was the most played song of 1973, publicaly elected the song of that year’s carnaval.
In musical wise matter, the album has some funk influences such as in labirinto negro, soul music in Não Tenho Medo, the popular brazilian genre samba in songs such Cala Boca Zebedeu and Eu quero botar meu bloco na rua. Some other songs like Filmes de Terror and Leros Leros e Boleros pay tribute to Sergio’s and Raul’s former project. While psychedelic elements can be found trough the whole album, the song that best embodies the elements of the anglophonic styled music is Viajei de Trem.
The records is mostly a trip, the A-side of the Vinyl original release is very progressive and psychedelic, working as a funnel the songs start “losing” elements, the b-side is much more intimist, purely brazilian: heavy percussion, acoustic guitar and other elements that made brazilian, purely brazilian and the decade that came before Sérgio. This album can be considered a passing torch from the past to the future of Brazil. Few albums were able to do this the same way this Sérgio album was to do this. A few years late, Sérgio Sampaio’s album is a masterpiece of what brazilian Tropicalia was all about. A modernistic brazilian experiment of Brazilians best and the internacional flavours at the time, the creation of a musicial frankenstein that was persecuted both by the goverment and by more the more reactionary sides of society and arts.
06. Zé Ramalho — Zé Ramalho II (A Peleja Entre o Diabo e o dono do Céu) (1979)
Another album influeced by the Progressive Thread that was going around at that time is the second album of Zé Ramalho, known only as ‘2’ or A Peleja Entre o Diabo e o Dono do Céu (The Fight between the devil and the the owner of the skies). Zé Ramalho, is another of the brazilian Northeastern artists that were releasing protest songs in the 60’s and 70’s. The singer-songwriter is largely known as one of the best brazilian writers all time, his songs about the people and own experiences rank on every rank about “best brazilian songs ever” in Brazil.
This album focus on the passivity of the “new brazilian”. In a historical focus, from 1930 and 1964 (before the coup) Brazil was known for his aggressive worker focused center-right/left politics. And after the military closed the democratic institutions and censored art and colleges, brazilians got passive. One of the songs from this album is Admirável Gado Novo, the name being influenced by The Brave New World translates literaly to Brave New Cattle and sings “Ye! Oh! Cattles Life / Marked Folk is happy folk!” much on the aceptance of the people of the, at that time, crumpling dictatorship, that was dragging Brazil to a huge inflation and recession that would lead to the re-democratization. This song is still used in protests or referenced every time the brazilian is conniving to corrupt or authoritarian power. The following song Falas do Povo can be translated both to Speaking OF the People (third person) and Speaking ABOUT the people (second person) where he sings “Life costs Réis (brazilian currecy at the time) / Whispering factories resonate again / the happiness of the people is dancing to samba and dream / I speak about the life / nothing new or old”, what keep the focus before instaurated in Admiravel Gado Novo.
On the instrumental side of the album, he is mostly played in acoustic guitars for the lead, but in different shapes such as the nylon popular guitars, 12 strings and steel guitars. Other notable aesthetic of the album is the use of orchestration, where violins together with other strings and metals can be heard trough out the album. Such as the other Northeastern albums, this one is yet another that combine the rich culture of the oldest part of brazil with newer versions of brazil and the world, songs such as Mote das Amplidões show this with ambient synthetizer pave the road to the acoustic guitar, bass and percussion play traditional folk northeastern music.
05. Rogério Duprat — A banda Tropicalista do Duprat (1968)
Rogério Duprat, the psychedelic conductor, can be described as the mind of the brazilian tropicália, a conductor from a wealthy São Paulo family, a marxist, he studied Social Sciences with the to be brazilian president Fernando Henrique Cardoso in college before dropping out and heading to the musical career, Duprat works are widely known for the anarchy of his sounding, one of his most well known songs is Gilberto Gil’s Domingo no Parque played by Os Mutantes and orchestraded by Duprat. This song gave Duprat the Best Arrangement prize at the 1967 Record Televion Music Festival (That prize was not official, it was invented after the group lead by Duprat and Gil played in a way to give the attention the Duprat work deserved).
This album is the third official album of the conductor and the first after he headed to the tropicalist moviment, is mostly instrumental but some songs have vocals provided by Os Mutantes, a Tropicalia group also from São Paulo. One of this songs is Canção Pra Inglês ver (A song to english see) the term “pra inglês ver” being a popular saying about doing something only in apparance, for other people to see, without having any substance whatsoever. So is this song, sang in pseudo-english and with portuguese words with american accent to rhyme with the few english they use. Is one of the trademarks of Tropicalia: joke around with lyrics. Rita Lee of Os Mutantes is the daughter of a american man and Duprat studied music in Germany, what made obvious for the brazilians that they did that music purely “to english see”.
Duprat’s album worked better than any résumé ever did. This is his work in full extent, everything he had on his mind put on a record. What mostly record labels would think as “profanity”. That he made popular with his previous works as a guest musician and conductor. A Banda Tropicalista do Duprat is what the soul of the Tropicalis is, you could pick any of the singers of the moviment to sing over the instrumentals and they would feel that this is their music. This record is by far the best from Duprat and one of the Tropicalia’s Magnum Opus.
04. Violeta de Outono — Violeta De Outono (1987)
Probably the best Post-Punk album from Brazil, draws some subtle influence from bands like Bauhaus and The Cure was mostly ignored by that brazilians that focused on the, in my opinion, much weaker Brasilia’s New Wave scene. Violeta sounding was the closer to the worldwide scene at that time in Brazil, without copying their sound, as some bands did. The copycat nature of brazilian music was a big thing through out the 80s, bands as Legião Urbana would copy the style of playing of bands such as Gang Of Four and the looks of The Smiths, while other bands were lacking in musical quality, putting little above or avearage music.
What made Violeta de Outono’s debut special is that, they of course, were influenced by the times Zeitgeist but at the same time they couldn’t care less about it. If a song as Outono would be clearly influenced by the British Post-Punk, a big thing in Brazil. The next song Declinio de Maio is influenced by late 60’s progessive rock. As the lead singer and guitarrist of the band Fábio Golfeti would say he has a huge influence of bands like Syd Barrett’s Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones (cited Their Satanic Majesties Requests as one of his top albuns) and Gong, a band he would play in later, as major influences in Violeta’s sounding. What makes this album such a big thing in my opinion is how experimental it is at the same time being a listener friendly record. The guitar in some songs is notable punk, with quick 4/4 beats, but in other songs they make music that could easily fit in A Saucerful of Secrets from Pink Floyd. Songs like Faces are notable influenced by Syd’s work.
In the songs that are inspired by post punk is most notable the influence of The Cure and Bauhaus, the song Luz being the most clear example from that, the vocals and solo guitar resamble much of In Flat Fields while the guitars in the verses reminded me of Killing An Arab from The Cure, what can be seen in other songs too.
03. Walter Franco — Revolver (1975)
Unfortunately this album is not more well regarded, being re-released in LP few years ago, together with Sérgio Sampaio’s Eu quero Botar meu Bloco na Rua. This album IS the album of the Brazilian Proto-Punk. A very close sounding to Iggy Pop & The Stooges three albums, the second Walter Franco album is fueled with quick music and concrete poetry. Besides not being reconized, but should!, as a member of the Proto-Punk wave, his music is considered Avant-garde and experimental.
The first song of the record, has two very interessant aspects to it. The first being to drums: Two things came to my mind when re-listen the album for the list, it remind me of the use of drum machine in new-wave and post punk few years later and also some Krautrock like NEU! was doing simultaneously in Germany. The other big thing i noticied in the songs were the guitars, that reminded me of the cited Iggy Pop and The Stooges, strongly present in the background, mainly the song Search And Destroy. Trough the album his vocal presence can be resambled by some of the punk greatest such as Richard Hell and the proper Iggy Pop. Revolver is a different spin to the other albums here, some songs are widly psychedelic and other could be in No New York or in an Television or Talking Heads album, one of this songs is Partir Do Alto / Animal Sentimental.
The album feels like a rollercoaster ride, from one song to the other, sometimes you fall, only to be brought up again and down again. The lyrical content is very concrete, quick or psychedelic poetry, similiar in some ways to Tom Zé lyrics, but with a different and own spin by Franco. If this gem was released in New York in the same year of 1975 it would probably rank with the New York Dolls and The Modern Lovers a a corner stone of Proto-Punk. Songs such Toque Frágil are very experimental mainly considering the very conservative Brazil of that time. This Walter record is nothing more than a master piece.
02. Di Melo — Di Melo (1975)
Di Melo’s debut album is yet another brazilian obscure gem. This is yet another album with the genius touch of Hermeto Pascoal, the first and for years the only record from Di Melo. His self titled record was released to poor reviews and sells, what made he gave up on the life as an artist, only to be brought back to “mainstream” in the 2010’s by the younger. Being re-released, this album is by far one of the best Funk albums you can find out there. Di Melo is criminally underrated, his vocal performance reminds of Sly of The Family Stone, such is his music.
Kilariô the first track is believed to be be the pronunciation of japanese imigrants of the word “Clariou” the portuguese to Lighten, is pretty much a american funk, such is the next two songs of the album A vida em seus metodos diz calma and Aceito Tudo. A little far from this more americanized music, Di Melo, another Northeastern, next two songs have a more brazilian touch, Conformopolis a song about the inevitable absurdity of modern life has a Accordion in the back, while a nylon guitar make the main riff. For the next song, who can be seen as continuity of the last Ma-lida the acoustic guitar is accompanied a set of strings, and later a drum kit join the group and from a very personal and deep song, the chorus go for a more “standard” samba-funk approach. This is followed by Sementes a Valsa inspired song, before the group return to the funk standard for the next song.
In overall, the album is a instrumental masterpiece, not the in lyrical sense its weak, but otherwise, is well written, but having Hermeto Pascoal in your line up will always make your instrumental take few steps forward in the right direction, this is why that Miles Davis called the brazilian albino for his records. But, returning to the subject, the nylon guitar has her songs, while the singer also work on more electric sounding as the firsts songs of the record or Se O Mundo Acabasse em Mel. Listening to this album really makes me think, why it took so long for the brazilian listeners to be ready for the record. Seen, this is by far my favourite brazilian funk/Soul album.
1. Jupiter Apple — Plastic Soda ( 1999)
The second solo album of Jupiter Maçã’s (which literally translates to Jupiter Apple) Plastic Soda, is probably the strangest album in this list, sometimes amazing sometime really strange, and i mean, REALLY strange. I could say even: phones ringing, cat meowing in the middle of a LSD fueled Psychedelic bossa nova strange. Jupiter’s career was long before the psychedelic part of it. A member of the Garage Rock bands TNT and Cascavelletes in the 80’s, his sound could be compared to the early rolling stones or bands like The Kinks. But when he broke with the later band, he took LSD for the first time and really got into the psychedelic Beatles, releasing in 1997 his first album A Sétima Efervecesncia which is considered one of the best psychedelic albuns in Brazil.
But, that album lack something, i can’t they you what, but this, his second, speaks to my soul in some degree, besides for it marks the start of the musician mental health decline, what is apparent in some songs, such the 9 minute long track one, he is still able to deliver us with some really amazing bossa at the same time his music is naive it feel so complicated at the same time. What makes me think Jupiter is the brazilian Syd Barrett, a genius tormented by his on adictions, what took him of what he could be one day. This for me is the peak of his career, aged 30, Plastic Soda is an excellent mix of psychedelic and modern brazilian popular music. Jupiter is a haunted genius of brazilian music, much like Arnaldo Baptista from os Mutantes that suffered from the same problems, both of them are two of the biggest names of the brazilian psychedelic music by a wide margin. Some times the mind of a genius charge very expensive prices. Jupiter passed away december, 21 five years ago (2015), only 47 years old in what was an already unrecognizable state of mind of the once great mind he had in the eighties and nineties.
In Memoriam of those in the list who passed away
