Here’s another monument to joy, Marcos Valle’s “Previsao do Tempo”, released in 1973 at the height of military dictatorship’s grip on power it contained some of the most relaxed and groovy music ever to come out of Brazil. Marco Valle, in my eyes, will always seem like the mutant spawn of Stevie Wonder, Brian Wilson, Harry Nilsson, and Joao Gilberto. Born in Rio, he had the look and manner of a California surfer nearly all his life. Its this blonde ambition that helped him navigate successfully on the outskirts of most transpiring Brazilian musical styles.
Gifted with a keen ear, he always had massive success within Brazil, and for a time in the US with “Samba de Verao” and “Os Grilos”, through the countless pop hits he would and could drop almost yearly, nearly all of them funky quasi-American influenced takes on more popular regional styles like Tropicalismo or bossanova. From his late 60s lounge music creations like, “Mustang Cor de Sangue” or the sinister bossanova of “Viola Enluarada”, through the absolute bossanova funk monster of 1970’s “Garra” and the progressive pop/Laurel Canyon sound of 1972’s “Vento Sul” there was always something strangely addictive and genuinely brilliant about his music.
What was always hidden within his music was all this pop experimentation and subversive lyrics that at that time most people were too busy grooving with to pay attention to. In 1973, inspired by the Jazz Fusion artists from America and his always present R&B influences, he wanted to introduce a more futuristic groove unlike any heard before. Marrying some of the warmest synthesizer sounds out there with his Rhodes electric piano, they became the background to his increasingly dreamier surfer vocal sound.
Cycling through all the blissful sounds he could come up with, he presented great soccer anthems like the one’s for Flamengo “Flamengo Ate Morrer”, electro soft-rock du jour such as in “Tira A Mao”, moody west coast Prog pop in the title track, Brian Wilson-like heartbreak in “Mais Do Que Valsa”, the ultimate cruising synth funk of “Nao Tem Nado Nao” and just brilliant amalgamations of all of these ear worm experiments in the final tracks “Samba Fatal”, “Tiu-Ba-La-Quieba”, and “De Repente Moca Flor”. Unified as a sound its very obviously indebted to the surfing sound of the West Coast in the US, but all these tweaks that didn’t exist before like synth funk and samba proved revolutionary, this is the stuff that drove artists in the US like Leon Ware and Shuggie to seek him out. Anyway, I’d think Marcos would have rather y’all zone out for a bit with this album, than hear me prat about it for much longer. This is simply an essential summer album and just a taste of what he could come up with…
World Cup Prediction of the Day:
Argentina v. Switzerland: Argentina (Winner)
Germany v. Algeria: Germany (Winner)