Feliz Natal da Bahia

Novos Baianos, Acabou Chorare: Misterio do Planeta

After a few posts, I've begun to realize that some of this music is not so new, so I guess I will remove some of my self-imposed rules and stop being so self-conscious of my postings... Let's just say it's music you might not have had access to, or known about. It's December 23rd, so it's reasonable to say that I'm going to take a few days off to celebrate the holidays with the fam.

Os Novos Baianos... The New Bahians (hailing from, you guessed it, Bahia, though not so new anymore...). Moraes Moreira, Pepeu Gomes, and Baby Consuelo (turned Baby Brazil) fronted this talented supergroup from the post-Tropicalia era of MPB (Musica Popular Brasileira... also, I'd like to apologize for not using accents... they're a pain in the ass to put in, and I'm having enough problems as it is trying to make Mozilla work with blogger).

You can definitely hear the Tropicalista influence on their tunes... The sophisticated arrangements, the rockin' out, the definitive Brazilian sound. In retrospect, it reminds me a lot of Os Mutantes stuff from the '70's, without the copious amounts of acid (though I suppose there was a fair bit of that going on... Os Novos Baianos lived together on a farm outside Rio during a four or five year period I believe). Like I was saying, post-Tropicalia. Though these guys had the benefit of Duane Allman, Eric Clapton, and the early 70's.

Misterio do Planeta is probably my favorite cut from this disc, which is a real lost classic in the annels of MPB. If you can find it, I highly recomment picking up the whole album. Other stuff, after Moreira left the band, is a bit more questionable though that's on a case by case basis... It seemed like Moraes really mellowed the rest of the band out, because when he left to pursue a solo career, Pepeu took over the compositions and everything became cracked out (musically speaking, of course). They started playing a lot of frevo (a really fast style of Samba) and trio electrico stuff which is crrrrazay. That being said, it's totally open to interpretation.

Incidentally, the Novos Baianos reunited last year or the year before and recorded a live album of the concert. It's definitely not as solid as the original stuff, but hey, if you're into reunions then by all means. Also, Davi Moraes, Moreira's son, is a talented musician in his own right, married to super-Axe-diva Ivete Sangalo, whose song "Boa Sorte" you have certainly heard if you've traveled to Brazil in the last year or so.

Ok, I'm gonna put up a poll soon about the best trax so far... This site has passed the "100 visitors in a day" milestone, so I want to thank everybody that is checking out the music. Tell your friends (virtual or otherwise)! Also, if you think I should be checking anything out (not just Brazilian... some day I'll post a complete list of my likes and dislikes up here), feel free to drop me a comment or an e-mail.