Sat in bed last night, thoroughly drained by London’s cold weather snap and a Sam Smith’s induced hangover, I chanced across these videos on Brazilian website TramaVirtual; two welcome reminders that summer is out there, somewhere.
Cidadão Instigado‘s album from 2009 ‘Uhhh’ is a joyous affair – 80s influenced Brazilian-rock-pop full of drums machines, wavy guitar solos, buoyant synths and Fernando Catatau’s bonkers vocals. In the video for “Contando Estrelas” below Fernando walks along a beach interspersed with shots of clouds and waves, then a guitar drops from the sky enabling him to perform the track’s fabulous guitar solo.
Alongside Rodrigo Brandao, Lurdez Da Luz is the other half of acclaimed Brazilian hip-hoppers Mamelo Sound System, yet here she’s flying solo with “Andei” – a double-bass led summer-vibes good-times hip-hop roller. It was shot around one of my favourite landmarks in São Paulo, the Niemeyer-designed Copan building. Bowling around the building Lurdez is joined by an ever-increasing group of friends till there’s enough of them for a block-party jam at the end.
Two necessary reminders that somewhere out there sun, fluffy clouds, happy people and blue skies still exist. I’ll be back with more summer vibes soon but for those of you reading this in Europe I advise you to wrap-up-warm as I heard it might snow this weekend…
(TramaVirtual is a portal that enables new Brazilian bands to offer their music for free. The videos were featured in various best-of 2010 lists posted by contributors – you can check the full lists here)
