O GLOBO - 10/02
One of the best Brazilian rock albums ever is the new one by Cascadura.
Two weeks ago, commenting here on Breno Silveira's "Gonzaga," I wrote that the show "Luiz Gonzaga volta pra curtir" might have been directed by Waly Salomão. It wasn't. The director was Jorge Salomão. Waly, according to Jorge himself, only created the title, which he quickly approved. The show is something that stuck in my mind as the official recognition of Gonzaga by the youth of that time. I said I missed a reference to this in the film, just as I missed Ivan Lins and Som Livre Exportação. When I stated that the absence of references to Tropicalismo didn't bother me, I wasn't rejecting it. I barely thought about the role of Tropicalismo in this episode. I remember hearing young countercultural people say that the Beatles were going to record "Asa Branca." This legend reveals a lot about the mental climate of the time. The resurgence of rural sounds that came with rock (and which Ruy Castro deplores in his book on bossa nova, considering it part of the murder of the great urban song of the 1930s and 40s) led young people to fantasize that the Brazilian countryside would enter the repertoire of top Anglo-Saxon pop-rock.
Not long ago, David Byrne finally recorded this classic of ours, fulfilling, decades late, the dream of the crazy people of 1968. David belongs to the top of Anglo-Saxon pop-rock and, accepting an invitation from Mauro Refosco (who, incidentally, is participating in an extra-Radiohead project by Thom Yorke, called Atoms for Peace), recorded "Asa Branca". In English, as the free-spirited of the sixties imagined the Beatles would do. The delirium of the crazy people came true. This delirium had connections with Tropicalismo.
Gil was always passionate about Luiz Gonzaga, never even pausing that love during the heroic phase of bossa nova, something I, a Gonzaga lover since I was 8, had gone through when I turned 17. Not that I disregarded Gonzaga's power, but I placed it on childish, schematic, and naive ground. That's how I saw him—without thinking too much about him—during the bossa nova period of my life. Tropicalismo brought the old Lua back to my heart. His pop invention of the accordion-zabumba-triangle combo had everything to do with Jorge Ben's "Se manda" and, therefore, with what we planned to achieve in our creations.
I'm not sure that the dream cherished by the young people of the late 1960s that the Beatles would have recorded "Asa Branca" wasn't one of the motivations behind my decision to record that song when I made my first London album. I sang it in exaggeratedly Pernambuco-accented Portuguese, accompanied only by my nylon-string guitar, in stark contrast to the fantasy of the free spirits. Of course, the primary reason was my situation as an exile: the lyrics, filled with hope for a return, said everything I wanted to say.
The definition of the Tropicalia attitude had many Pernambuco elements. Not only Gil's love for Gonzaga and his repeatedly mentioned visit to Recife just before the pop turn in Brazilian song production. There was also (and this is especially true for me) the groundbreaking invention of the trio elétrico—and this cannot be understood without the passage of the Vassourinhas bloco through Salvador in 1949: the frevo-anthem of this Recife group became the eternal anthem of the Bahian carnival. The electrified carnival of Bahia was an overwhelming force known only to the inhabitants of Salvador. It encouraged us to electrify our music and helped us get closer to rock in a very unique way. And rock entered the carnival, with the trios sounding somewhere between heavy metal and progressive rock from the 1970s onwards. The history of rock in Bahia is intense and rich—and, although rock musicians need to oppose the carnival, it cannot exist without recognizing itself in it. Not only did Raul, Marcelo Nova, and Pitty go out into the world shouting about Salvadoran rock: rock had already entered the bloodstream of Carnival itself.
To be fair, one of the best Brazilian rock albums ever is Cascadura's new one, "Aleluia." I'm deeply happy: Zeca (still a child) and I listened passionately to this resilient band's CD when they recorded "Nicarágua." They never faltered. Now they bring us an extensive and dense work, with complex rhythms, rich timbres, and spectacular interpretations by Fábio. It's a truly great album that all rock lovers should hear. It's also significant that I heard it right after seeing Luiz Caldas close a hot night at Fantoches with "Vassourinhas." Baiana System also spoke about the history of the Bahian guitar, looking to the future. There are references to Carnival in "Aleluia." I'll listen to more. And talk more. I get lost in thought: I want to be as fair as Solomon.
