Month: September 2018

words: Guilherme Lucas (freely translated by Raquel Pinheiro); photos: Guilherme Lucas

Newcastle’s Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs gave their second concert of the Portuguse leg of their European last Wednesday night at Maus Hábitos called the King of Cowards Tour exactly the name of his latest work – King of Cowards – released this month. Therefore, promotion concerts and to mitigate longing since it is a return to Portugal.
Going exclusively with the set list chosen by the band for this show in Porto, I will say, without any doubt or hesitation, that I was in front of a sludge 100% band. Listening carefully to their discography that is fully confirmed, although there are other directions, towards other genres in it, as in the case of stoner rock, hard/metal, hardcore punk and some psychedelic. The orwellian 7xPigs are, in such regard, a very happy crossing of those several categories. They are convincing.

The concert of the collective at Maus Hábitos was always on a single tone and a single speed: extremely physical, very sweaty and devastating. As one wants it to be. Everyone in the audience appreciated the band’s attitude and posture. The “orwellian”7xPigs offered the audience a very good concert.

For me, and resorting to my memory palace and my formative memory live the band can very eloquently both sound to Motorhead or Rollins Band/Black Flag (via Black Sabbath) …   only because of voice and brutal performance of their vocalist, Matt Batty, a real stage animal. The man manages to be a well-conceived simulacrum between Lemmy’s voice and Henry Rollins’ legendary performances, but with a tattoosless body. Other than that, i tis all there. Matt Baty screams and screams as if there is no future and no hope … I have very few people succeed in doing tso with class and range. He achieves it in an unquestionable way. His band comrades are also very cohesive and willful in the manner they instrumentally insure the apocalyptic and almost suffocating sound vertigo of each played theme. These 7x Pigs are categorically a hardcore band in the way they expose their most extreme emotions to the audience. Without being surprised by their performance (perhaps because I was already waiting for it), they were able to play deep in my heart of darkness. These pigs are very recommendable.

texto e fotos: Guilherme Lucas

Os ingleses (de Newcastle), Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, deram, nos Maus Hábitos, na passada quarta-feira, o seu segundo concerto em terras lusas, da sua presente tour europeia – denominada de “King of Cowards Tour” – exatamente o nome do seu último trabalho – King of Cowards – lançado este mês. Concertos de divulgação, portanto, e para matar saudades, já que é um regresso ao cantinho.

Baseando-me exclusivamente na set list escolhida pela banda para este seu espetáculo na Invicta, direi, sem qualquer margem para dúvida ou hesitação, que estive perante uma banda 100% de tipologia sludge. Escutando atentamente a sua discografia, isso é plenamente confirmado, embora exista na mesma outras incursões a outros géneros, como é o caso do stoner rock, o hard/metal, o punk hardcore e algum psicadelismo. Os 7xPigs são, nesse aspeto, um muito feliz cruzamento destas várias categorias. São convincentes.
O concerto do coletivo nos Maus Hábitos foi sempre de um só registo e de uma única velocidade: extremamente físico, muito suado e devastador. Como se quer. E toda a assistência agradeceu essa atitude e postura, por parte da banda. Foi um muito bom concerto, aquele com que os 7xPigs “orwellianos” brindaram todo o público presente.

Para mim, e recorrendo ao meu baú de memórias mais queridas e formativas, a banda tanto consegue soar ao vivo a Motorhead como a Rollins Band/Black Flag (por via Black Sabbath), de forma muito eloquente… e tudo unicamente, e só, pela voz e a performance brutal do seu vocalista, Matt Batty, um autêntico animal de palco. O homem consegue ser um simulacro muito bem engendrado entre a voz de um Lemmy e as atuações lendárias de um Henry Rollins, mas num corpo sem tatuagens. De resto, está lá tudo. Matt Baty berra e grita como se não houvesse futuro nem esperança… tenho visto muitos poucos a conseguirem fazer isto com classe e amplitude. Ele consegue-o de forma inquestionável. E os outros camaradas de banda são também muito coesos e voluntariosos na forma como seguram instrumentalmente a vertigem sonora, apocalíptica e quase sufocante de cada um dos temas interpretados. Estes 7x Pigs são categoricamente uma banda hardcore na forma como expôem ao público as suas mais extremas emoções. Sem me terem surpreendido com a sua atuação (talvez porque já a esperava nestes moldes), conseguiram tocar fundo no meu coração das trevas. Muito aconselháveis estes porcos.

words: Guilherme Lucas (freely translated by Raquel Pinheiro); photos: Guilherme Lucas

Witch Sin – Mirandela, Trás-os-Montes’ stoner rock trio Witch Sin, opened the night, at Woodstock 69 the rentreé with  Americans Yawning Man (Official) as headliners. The band gave a very effective and decent concert, still with some edges to round. If commitment and instrumental mastery are undeniable when it comes to sound and aesthetic in which they wander (stoner rock with some psychedelic/environmental tones, especially some of the themes intros), it is also true that they still lack some fluidity in the connection between distinct movements of their songs – in some cases even showing some brief confusion and nervousness – which I presume will be solved with future concerts. It will be useful to correct those small incongruities. As a final note, and because it was a very efficient opening from a small band to a larger band, the audience showed its delight with losts of applause.

Yawning Man – Californians Yawning Man, a seminal band and living legend of desert rock (that decisively influenced the whole emerging stoner rock scene in the late 1980s), gave a great in their single national one before an admiring and respectful audience of their, by the end clearly grateful for the irreproachable performance. Therefore, with the venue practically filled with people that knew what they were looking for Woodstock deserves to be congratulated for bringing this important and historic group to Portugal.

Fortunately, live, Yawning Man showed to be multifaceted group of distinct trends. Thier discography shows it: different musical phases with varied sound textures, but with the same quality and gender mark. Practically, if we except the three final themes (more accelerated and powerful stoner rock), the whole show was within an environmental/psychedelic register and with a rhythmic cadence – more slow than fast. The trio displayed an undeniable sonority that remits to shoegaze (yes, shoegaze, not a mistake), mostly because of their guitarist, Gary Arce, master of an unusual thumb technique that performs magnifically, on a more environmental than psychedelic typology that fills the collective entire sound. While all the “pile” of desert rock/stoner bands make Black Sabbath solos and the like, Yawning Man indicate other unusual sound and aesthetic possibilities within the stoner universe, but no less interesting. This is what sets them apart: while currently stoner rock is practically depleted and has nearly no revitalization ability Yawning Man take a unique path. Maybe because they its parents, but also because they realized long ago that they can set different paths, without ever losing the already achieved credibility. They are also part of a generation of controversial and unique musicians and personalities since they have always been associated to the breath of artists from SST Records, Black Flag’s record label. That counts, and a lot, to understand the versatility of the group in terms of tastes and influences in their music.

This was a show that will surely remain in the future memory of many, not only for its excellence, filled with many good moments of great quality, but also because it was the one where the bar’s room temperature was (almost) the same as the desert’s one. It was a great concert at the Woodstock, with the prospect of another handful of good concerts until the end of the year

texto e fotos: Guilherme Lucas

O trio de stoner rock transmontano (de Mirandela), Witch Sin, abriu a noite, na rentreé do bar Woodstock 69 com os norte-americanos Yawning Man (Official) como cabeça-de-cartaz. A banda deu um concerto muito eficaz e decente, mas ainda com algumas arestas a limar. Se é inegável o comprometimento e o domínio instrumental, no espetro sonoro e estético em que vagueiam (stoner rock com alguns laivos psicadélicos/ambientais, principalmente nos intros de alguns dos seus temas), também não é menos verdade que ainda revelaram alguma falta de fluidez na ligação entre andamentos distintos das suas músicas – em alguns casos até mesmo alguma breve confusão e nervosismo – que presumo, venham a ser sanados, com futuros concertos, que serão úteis para corrigir certamente estas pequenas incongruências. Como nota final, e porque foi uma abertura muito eficiente de uma banda pequena para com uma maior, o público presente deu mostras do seu agrado, com bastantes aplausos

Os californianos Yawning Man (Official), banda seminal e lenda viva do desert rock (que influenciou determinantemente toda a cena de stoner rock emergente nos finais dos anos 80), deram um excelente concerto no Woodstock 69, em data única nacional, com um público admirador e respeitador do seu som e claramente agradecido, no final, com a atuação irrepreensível. Por isso, e com a casa praticamente cheia de quem sabia ao que ia, o Woodstock está de parabéns por ser responsável pela vinda deste importante e histórico grupo ao nosso país.

Os Yawning Man revelaram ao vivo ser um grupo (felizmente) multifacetado e de tendências distintas. A sua discografia revela isso mesmo: diferentes fases musicais com texturas sonoras variadas, mas com a mesma marca de qualidade e de género. Praticamente, se excetuarmos os três temas finais (mais stoner rock acelerado e poderoso), todo o espetáculo foi dentro de um registo ambiental/psicadélico e em ritmo cadenciado – mais para o lento do que para o rápido. O trio exibiu uma inegável sonoridade que remete para o shoegaze (sim, shoegaze, não é erro), muito devido aos solos do seu guitarrista, Gary Arce, dono de uma invulgar técnica de polegar, e que os executa de forma magnífica, de tipologia mais ambiental do que psicadélica, e que preenchem na totalidade o som do coletivo. Enquanto todo o “monte” de bandas de desert rock/stoner fazem os solos à la Black Sabbath e afins, estes Yawning Man indicam outras possibilidades sonoras e estéticas pouco comuns no universo stoner, mas não menos interessantes. E é nisto que são distintos: enquanto este está praticamente esgotado e com muita pouca capacidade revitalizadora na atualidade, os Yawning Man fazem o seu caminho de forma única. Talvez porque sejam os pais da mesma, mas também porque perceberam há muito que podem determinar caminhos diferentes, sem nunca perderem a credibilidade já alcançada. Fazem parte também de uma geração de músicos e personalidades polémicas e singulares, pois sempre estiveram associados ao leque de artistas da editora SST Records, dos Black Flag. Isso conta, e muito, para se entender a versatilidade do grupo a nível de gostos e influências várias na sua música.
Este foi um espetáculo que certamente ficará para memória futura de muitos, não só pela sua excelência, recheado de muitos bons momentos de enorme qualidade, mas também porque foi aquele onde a temperatura ambiente no bar era (quase) igual à de um deserto. Foi uma grande rentreé do Woodstock, com a perspetiva de mais um punhado de bons concertos até ao final do ano

Yawning Man © Guilherme Lucas

Yawning Man © Guilherme Lucas

Pharaoh Overlord © Rafael Farias

PHARAOH OVERLORD – Great concert given by Finnish band Pharaoh Overlord afternoon Sunday on palco Piscina on the last day of the Millhões. The band is no less than the five Circle’s members (that have played Milhões two days ago), this time with a different posture and sound proposal. They wandered, carburazing for an hour between four themes carved with wisdom and enlightenment, and at the same time with the simplicity of the essential and the strict discipline with which they played. Of strong krautrock inclination (all the rhythms were from the motorik), there was a careful and laborious execution by strings, within the aesthetic logic mentioned above of stretching to the maximum the possibilities of creation, largely by improvisation (this was, confirmed to me by guitarist Jane Westerlund). The result was expected that is, the continuous sensation of being on a mental journey through the Cosmos, between the environmental and the psychedelic, where at times because of slight alterations of intensities, mainly by tonal alteration of the bass, explosions of energy are described. Music to be listened to preferably with closed eyes and swinging the body to its rhythm. In the end, the quintet was effusively applauded by the audience and the musicians also showed their contentment for a performance at all levels exemplary. At Milhões my early afternoons are always good.

JOHNNY HOOKER – The greatest magic, sometimes larger than life itself, occurred splendidly late Sunday afternoon on palco Piscina. Johnny Hooker, the Pernambuco native that is making a rage and conquering the “world” in a meteoric fashion, renewing current MPB, is a star more luminous than the Sun, and for whom I lack adjectives to describe it. For that very reason, I will not do it, urgently inviting those who do not know it yet, know him as his music to get to know it. Listening to his voice, rarest in its excellence, less than a meter from his presence, where all his rebellion is exposed in his courageous and audacious transgressive performance, is an experience that, when his name will be referred to in the future, I will never Forget. Johnny Hooker is an activist of the Brazilian LGBT movement, assumed homosexual, and through his lyrics and songs is giving rise to a whole controversial context of support, but also of fierce protest with which he is growing in public exposure and media levels. The Brazilian, a mix between David Bowie, Madonna and Caetano Veloso, as he himself describes his greatest influences, that made him what he is today, is one of those chosen, through his art, to change small worlds, since nobody changes the World. His success already proves it. One might ask: but is it because he is gay and a LGBT activist, or does this recognition lies only in his artistic side? I have concluded from his extraordinary, already legendary concert at Milhões that it is both. Also from a brief informal conversation with the artist, but if he has to be just one of them, the answer is: the art. No one is adored or appreciated without a gift; without some level of quality. And that Johnny Hooker has in spades for decades to come. Currently, he is already the future of MPB.  Many thanks Milhões for placing putting him on the line-up. Concerts like this save the day … P.S. : I was never  a Bowie’s fan and never understood the worship that more than half of the world has for his Ziggy Stardust phase. Now I understand them.

THE HELIOCENTRICS – This English band is, of all the ones that I have in Milhões the easiest one to be described regarding their sound. They are absolutely all that one wants to glue to them when it comes to genres (except rock’n’roll, blues, punk and metal); that aside, here, anything goes. They are jazz, experimental, electronic, folk, krautrock, environmental, psychedelic, funk, trip-hop, world music … anyway, the group has practically no stylistic borders and it is impossible to catalog them with one genre. The band clearly assumes this aesthetic attitude of not having an aesthetic, but several. In the show they played on palco Milhões, I identified the played themes an insistence on trip-hop, jazz, space-rock textures and mantric voices (with many similarities to the folkloric chorus The Mystery of Bulgarian Voices) … but others come to mind. The group consists of excellent musicians who guarantee consistency and a remarkable involvement of their themes. And its singer, Just B, the one upon whom all the attention is concentrated, develops an elegant and restrained performance; without major changes. She expresses herself more with the voice than with the body. Here there is clearly a defined posture. They gave a great concert, where the psychedelic aesthetics/ trip to the Cosmos images projected in the background scenery fully worked out as an adjuvant of the music. Between themes the audience always showed its it was pleased. In the end, with insistent applause the band returned to an encore of a theme. Of all the bands I saw it the first time I watched one in Milhões. Totally deserved.

OS TUBARÕES – The legendary and veteran Cabo Verde group was a sure choice to end Milhões in celebration the Millions on the stage with the same name. Very well known in our culture for its popularity among our fellow countrymen and others, derived in great part by the cultural and affective ties that unite the two countries in the pre and post Portuguese decolonization, afterwards and until now by the reality of the immigration of its citizens to our country, the group of Cidade da Praia does not require great presentations. Everyone knows (at least) that they are one of the major representatives of funaná, coladeras and mornas, inside and outside CaboVerde. Therefore, ambassadors. I retained two aspects that pleased me a lot from the concert: their music is completely up-to-date, modern in its interpretation, in a way that surprised me a lot. I confess I was initially going with the pre-conceived idea that something vintage and dated might be heard, given the age of its members; it did not happen at all. I found them profoundly magical interpreting the mornas. There were moments when I had shivers, what a strange thing … I think it’s nostalgia. Musicians of excellence and very good taste in the execution of the arrangements of the themes, and a magnificent voice, with a warm and distinctive tone, with a very accurate alignment of themes, it was not difficult to grab the audience from the first theme until the end. They were allowed to do as they pleased with the audience, and it showed visible in the way the audience already reacted to their movements: funaná and coladeras: immediate dancing; mornas: sighs and a tear … It was with a ball of enormous quality with which Milhões toasted everyone present. Everybody was dancing where there was room for it, it was beautiful to watch it. And for the second time, I attended the second encore of a band at the festival. Milhões 2018 ended with a flourish.

words: Guilherme Lucas (freely translate by Raquel Pinheiro); photos: Rafael Farias &  Renato Cruz Santos.

original text: https://www.facebook.com/events/880971952100146/permalink/957108184486522/