This time,
Sergio Mendes
freed himself from any commercial expectations, plunged deep into Brazil, and came up with a boldly experimental yet beautifully impressionistic album of Brazilian folk and popular music. Many of the tracks here are ritualistic in structure, with call-and-response vocals, sprinkled with native Brazilian percussion instruments like the agogo, cuica, atabaques and the weird single-string berimbau, creating mysterious moods and grooves.
Oscar Castro-Neves
-- whose guitar shines throughout the album -- and bassist
Sebastiao Neto
wrote one gorgeous tune,
"After Sunrise,"
and
Mendes
adapts folk songs as well as
Baden Powell's
"Iemanja" and
Dori Caymmi's
now-well-known "Promessa de Pescador" to the blend of
Brasil '77
female vocals and Brazilian tropical sounds. The record is dominated by a single, gigantic 19-minute piece, "The Circle Game," a rambling, multi-sectioned tour de force with extended Brazilian grooves, properly exotic jazz flute solos from
Tom Scott
, and dissonant improvisations touching on the jazz avant-garde. Understandably,
Primal Roots
remained dear to
Mendes'
heart even though it was not a sales blockbuster, and it gives credence to the not-often-floated idea of
as innovator, whose uncompromising explorations of world music sounds place this record years ahead of its time. ~ Richard S. Ginell