Saturday 4 April 2015, 8pm
Great Brazilian double bill from Novas Frequências – an experimental music festival connected to the new trends of contemporary music that emerged in 2011 in Rio de Janeiro – featuring intense, rock-based free jazz trio Chinese Cookie Poets, and Negro Leo - a singer, songwriter and musicians who takes his cues from both Brötzmann and no-wave.
Chinese Cookie Poets is a Brazilian trio from Rio de Janeiro that started in 2010 with Marcos Campello (electric guitar), Felipe Zenícola (electric bass) and Renato Godoy (drums). A surly rock, physical and ludic; A rocker free jazz, with a stop-and-go esthetic and breathtaking dynamics in short compositions. A live concert from Chinese Cookie Poets is always a blend of brutal intensity and meticulous interventions with strictly arranged compositions but with blank spots for improvised sections without sounding as two diverse areas. After releasing two EPs, they released in 2012 their first full-length album called Worm Love, featuring composer/guitar player Arto Lindsay in one track. In 2013 they released Danza Cava, a collaboration with Brazilian trumpet player Nicolau Lafetá. In 2014 Chinese Cookie Poets released their fifth album called ■ and toured around Europe doing 8 concerts in 6 countries.
Based in Rio de Janeiro, Negro Leo is a singer, songwriter and musician from Maranhão. Influenced by Peter Brötzmann's free jazz, by Caetano Veloso and Jards Macalé's "tropicalismo", and by James Chance and Arto Lindsay´s no wave, Negro Leo has been highlighted in Rio´s scene alongside bands linked to Quintavant, an event that happens at Audio Rebel and includes artists such as Chinese Cookie Poets, Cadu Tenorio and Bemônio. This scene has got some attention from The Wire, Noisey, Tiny Mix Tapes, and others. In Ilhas de Calor ("Heat Islands"), his fourth album, Leo followed an unprecedented procedure in his work: the album was developed from impromptu sessions with the musicians Thomas Harres (Abayomy Afrobeat Orchestra, drums), Felipe Zenícola (Chinese Cookie Poets, bass) and Eduardo Manso (Bemônio, Rabotnik, guitar) and Leo himself playing guitar, Wurlitzer, clavinet, and modulating many timbres of his voice.
From editions held on improvisation, Leo wrote the lyrics and sang on the bases, printing on each an incendiary and urgent poetics. (Un)songs characterized by strong lyrics and delirious images of everyday life, interpersonal relations and the global political crisis. The violence, the heat of the streets and poetry form a fragmentary and filled puzzle of ideas that invites the listener to a radical experience.
