Two years ago, when we worried about things as comparatively light as whether or not our favorite TV show would make it through the next cut — they never did, by the way — I fell in love. Not your garden-variety, conventional hottie of the month crush, but a genuine I want to have her babies obsession.
Her name is Bebel, and she's Brazilian Royalty, thankyouverymuch. She's never met me, but that's not gonna stop her from thinking I'm the cat's pajamas.
I'm sure it's happened to all of us to a degree. The music that lifts your heart through the roof and puts you anywhere your mind can imagine. Vocals so beautiful that they bring you to the point of tears each time. That's what Bebel Gilberto's Tanto Tempo [Six Degrees Records] does to me.
The offspring of a family that spans decades.....scratch that....that built bossanova, Bebel Gilberto is single-handedly bringing back some of the most beautiful music ever created. For those uninitiated to the bossanova, it goes much deeper than Girl From Ipanema, although the good stuff usually falls from the same tree.
During the recording of Tanto Tempo, Bebel's producer Suba was killed in a car accident. He never heard the end result of his wonderful work. Although I don't speak Portuguese, I can only imagine that every song is Bebel's longing for Suba. I could be wrong, though, but I doubt it.
The musical legacy of Bebel's family lives through this disc. Gilberto Gil, Joao and Astrud Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim were setting the standard for bossanova in the early 1960's. During that time jazz legend Stan Getz played a major role in bringing the relaxed, sensual music into the mainstream American audience, starting a worldwide obsession with the passionate phrasing and melodies of the South American style. Like much other music of that period, however, it was drowned-out by the emergence of The Beatles, although it didn't suffer the same fate that many other types of music did at the time.
Article comments
1 - db
Excellent review of an excellent album. You might also want to try the remix CD based on her songs. It is different but very interesting.
2 - hoopty
Hey, thanks!
I previewed it in Borders a couple of months ago. I like it, but I really loved that rendition of Batucada that Towa Tei did of hers. I was hoping it would be on it. Have you heard it? Makes my booty shake.
3 - jadedju
Oh baby, it's all about Bebel. Haven't stopped listening since I got the disc for Christmas.
4 - martin
Suba was not killed by a car accident, but by a fire trying to rescue his music