afrobeat, afrofunk, afrojazz, afrorock, african boogie, african hiphop …: From Portugal/ Brazil: Carapaus Afrobeat
Shortly after arriving in Lisbon, Portugal, in 2017, guitarist Zé
Victor Gottardi joined eight more Brazilian and Portuguese musicians to
form Carapaus Afrobeat. Before landing on the old
continent, Zé had already played in the Abayomy Afrobeat Orchestra, of
which he was one of the founders, and had also played with Jards Macalé
and Céu. His goal with Carapaus is to revere African music, faithfully
following the concept of the word afrobeat: “beat of afro origin”.
“I realized that the afrobeat scene was very vague [in Lisbon], there was only one band, They Must Be Crazy,
[who are] very good by the way. I booked a Fela Day, which is an event
to celebrate Fela Kuti’s birthday, and I set up Carapaus for the
occasion. The members were very well chosen, they’re all monsters”, says
Zé.”On the guitar with me there is Gabriel Muzak, who played with
Frequency Selectors and Funk Fuckers, as well as Adriana Calcanhotto.
On the drums there’s Del, who has played with Roberta Miranda. On
keyboard there’s Cláudio Andrade who has accompanied Gilberto Gil, Jorge
Ben Jor and Seu Jorge for 10 years. On the bass Ricardo Dias Gomes, who
played with Caetano for 10 years. On the trumpet, Cláudio Gomes, one of
the band’s two Portuguese [members]. He’s very active in the Lisbon
music scene. On the trombone André Pimenta, also Portuguese, on the sax
Alexandre Pinheiro, a saxophonist from Belém do Pará, who is fundamental
to give a more Amazonian smell to the band. In percussion we have
Duvale, a master who has ruled the timbal wing at the samba school of
Mangueira (Rio de Janeiro), in addition to playing with Gabriel o
Pensador and Sandra de Sá”.
This musical quality, added to the lack of afrobeat bands in Portugal,
helped Carapaus quickly gain prominence. His commitment to maintaining
all the original cadence of the African rhythm is clear on all eight
tracks of the group’s second album, Dois. The
influences of Fela Kuti and Tony Allen (who played on the single “Do
Allen / Diabo na Terra”, along with with Boss AC and Oghene Kologbo,
which preceded the album’s release) are evident. But it is not only the
Nigerian source of afrobeat that supplies components. The bases also
have funk, jazz, ska, elements of Portuguese musicality and spicy
Afro-Brazilian seasoning, taking references from Naná Vasconcelos, Tim
Maia, Elza Soares and from the batuques of African religions.
“We like to be broader with the issue of influences. We have Afrobeat
in the name, but we take it more literally. Everything we like came
from Africa: jazz, blues, funk, hip hop… everything had a direct
influence from the African continent or its immigrants, so we think it
makes more sense for us not to just be stuck with the Nigerian style of
playing”.
This whole merger generates good results. The texture
created also reveals the Latin DNA that Carapaus music has in its
genetics. The different experiences used lead to a groove with Latin
American rhythmic patterns, despite being recorded in Europe across two
sessions. It has a swing. Some videos of live performances show the
energy that the group led by Zé transmits. However, their upcoming
performances had to be cancelled, as with everyone else, due to the
Coronavirus pandemic, just at the moment when they had found their
space, ascending in the Portuguese music scene with their new album
freshly released.
“There was no time to do practically anything.
At first we were very weak, and little by little we resumed our
activities the way we did. We recorded a series of songs at home,
literally each one at home, and it was super cool. [The videos are on YouTube.]
But we are resuming contacts with festivals, sending material and doing
what we can”, says Zé with optimism. “We have content already recorded
for about 2 more records, but we still have to relaunch Dois,
since we were unable to play as we had planned. We hope that in 2021 we
will be able to circulate in Europe, because the band has extreme
potential”.
