Outro Tempo II: Electronic and Contemporary Music from Brazil, 1984-1996 is the second installment of Music From Memory’s Brazilian series. This volume picks up where the first Outro Tempo left off, shedding light on a new wave of experimentalism that emerged in Brazil in the late 1980s and 1990s. The twenty tracks collected uncover another area of Brazilian music that looked to the future for inspiration. This time it drifts beyond the rainforest and into the pulsating heart of Brazil’s great cities, where it meets a generation of young artists eager to radically change the face of contemporary Brazilian music. In Outro Tempo II the avant garde and pop worlds meld in a haze of percussion and electronics. It presents another uncompromising and magnetic reinterpretation of the limits of Brazilian music.
Rooted in European music, native folk traditions and often infused by jazz, Brazilian music encompasses a huge variety of dance forms and songs. Prize-winning guitarist Pedro Aguiar has selected a panoramic recital to illustrate these elements which include the choro and music rich in melody and rhythmic vitality. From Villa-Lobos, whose Choros No. 1 is one of the most popular guitar solos ever written, through to the work of the revered Dilermando Reis, and on to contemporary examples of the genre, this is music of dazzling virtuosity and finesse.
This Gilberto Gil reissue of an album recorded in 1987 brings several of his hits under a new dressing, consisting of contemporary rhythms such as funk and reggae, mixed with Caribbean influences and Brazilian music. An electric album with plenty of brass attacks, it is fully danceable yet melodically rich and lyrically expressive. "Aquele Abraço," "Vida," "Soy Loco Por Ti America," "Babá Alapalá," and "Mar de Copacabana" are all classic successes of Gil's, interpreted in the version presented to 150 thousand people during the Rock in Rio festival.