Friday Pick of the Week
You may have read
the recent New Yorker article about Brazilian singer
Caetano Veloso and his new album, Ce. In it, Sasha Frere-Jones makes the point, well-known to Veloso fans, that Veloso is often described as Bob Dylan.
No offense to Dylan, but I think it's really the other way around. While Dylan is thought of as a rebel and a protester, Veloso is far more radical, far more dangerous, than Dylan ever was; Veloso was actually jailed in the late 1960s by the military dictatorship in Brazil—with no charges filed, and how terrifying that must be—before leaving for a multi-year exile in France. As one of the founders of tropicalia, the Brazilian protest (in the right context) music that has helped to capture that country's image of beauty mixed with tragedy, Veloso has had a profound influence on the music of a nation that's bigger than the continental United States. And as ambitious a lyricist as Dylan is, Veloso challenges his listeners a bit more, I think.
He does the same musically—Veloso seems to experiment with different styles on every album—and Ce is no different. Frere-Jones calls it a rock album. I guess, but it's not really like any rock you've ever heard. In different places, it's weird and catchy and lovely, sometimes difficult and sometimes almost instantly addictive.
Give it a listen on iTunes—the second song, "Minhas Lagrimas," is a nice place to start. And those who really like it might want to read his autobiography,
Tropical Truth, which is both a personal history and a social, cultural and political one. Veloso is a fascinating man, well worth getting to know.
