Marcos ValleReleased in 1969 as Odeon MOFB 3588
Eumir Deodato – arrangements on ‘Dia de vitória’
Orlando Silveira – arrangements on ‘Samba de verão 2’ and ‘Os dentes brancos do mundo’
Maurício Mendonça and Marcos Valle – arrangements and orchestration on ‘Mustang cor de sangue’
Novelli – baixo
Victor Manga – bateria
Nanâ Vasconcelos – percussion
Produced by Milton Miranda
———————–
Marcos Valle was a chameleon, but he was always Marcos Valle.
“Mustange cor de sangue” is another solid effort from the Brothers Valle, much more in a pop vein than “A viola enluarda” from the previous year. From the start you can hear a strong influence of the `pilantragem` of Wilson Simonal, who would in fact rerecord the title track this same year. This song and “Os dentes brancos do mundo” are cited by Marcos as being critiques against consumerism and social inequality, while Samba de Verão No.2 is a comment about the changed turbulent times that left with people neither “the calm or the piece necessary to appreciate ‘Samba de verão’ from his second album. (Reading between the lines, it’s as if he is saying that song has outlived its relevance by 1969… Unfortunately Samba de Verão No.2 is also nowhere near as memorable a tune as its namesake, but holds its own.)
The jazzy slightly funk-inflected Azymuth would be the inspiration for the name of that band, who would eventually come to work with Marcos a few years later. The songs “O Evangelho segundo San Quentin” is one of the more beguiling, rather abstract piece of avant-pop, followed by another gorgeous collaboration with Milton Nascimento, “Diálogo”, which ends the original album. (This would be the last time Milton would appear on a Marcos Valle album as far as I am aware, which is odd since Marcos would soon record with Som Imaginario and continue to collaborate with people associated with Milton. My celebrity-gossip guess, based on nothing, is that Milton had an unrequitted love crush on blond-haired blue-eyed Marcos and hence had to stop appearing on his albums). The whole album leaves my tongue twittering to utter the phrase “transitional” album as its flirtations with psychedelia, rock, and an alchemical stew of bossa, samba, pop, and jazz idioms make this album into more of an introduction to his 1970s work than a closing chapter on his 1960s` “canon”.
The bonus tracks here are particularly cool. The alternate instrumental take of “Tigre de Esso, que sucesso” is quite funkier, leaving it to our imagination what it would have sounded like if it was chosen as the album take. “Feio aerodinamico” would appear on Marcus’s next album, and here we get a very different instrumental version. The last song, “Beijos sideral” is likewise a piece of grandoise quase-psychedelic pop.
The usual suspects appearing in the lineup, with Victor Manga on drums this time and Nanâ Vasconcelos on percussion, oddly enough.
I found a cool review of this album in Portuguese that does a better job of describing the album and its context, including some interpretations of Paulo’s surreal lyrics on some of the tunes. Pity I have no time for a translation right now, so those who are interested can check it out via Google translator. Its written by Leonardo Bonfim at an online magazine called “Freakium!”
É o disco que marcou a mudança
definitiva na carreira de Marcos Valle, que deixou de soar brasileiro
para soar universal. Há influência de samba, jazz, soul,
psicodelia, Beatles, Burt Bacharach e Pilangragem, tudo fermentando
um som completamente original. Um texto de Marcos e Paulo Sergio explicava
alucinadamente o conceito do disco. Vale a pena reproduzí-lo
na íntegra:
“Se o filósofo Diógenes
vivesse hoje, procuraria um homem de verdade como os faróis de
um Mustang… Muito louco, pois só perdendo o juízo eu
acho a cabeça. E veja os Dentes Brancos do Mundo… sorrindo,
rindo, marijuanizado. E o mendigo que morreu enforcado no ‘hall’
(ou Hal) do elevador seria Cristo? Christo – próton – Deus –
Segundo Evangelho de S. Quentin. Das 3 às 6 graxa pelo chão,
torre de petróleo, meu pássaro é o avião,
a a ve a nave, amando o Tigre da Esso – que Sucesso. Neste mundo anormal
alucinógeno para ficar normal. Só perdendo o juízo
achamos a cabeça.”
A loucura do texto também estava
presente em canções como a “pilantra” “Os
Dentes Brancos do Mundo”, que citava maconha, masturbação
e ressaltava a perigosa frase do encarte: “Só perdendo o
juízo, eu acho a cabeça”; a soul-psicodélica
“Mustang Cor de Sangue” e a lounge “Tigre Esso que Sucesso”,
que faziam uma crítica bem humorada ao consumismo exagerado;
e na inusitada “O Evangelho Segundo San Quentin”, que lamentava
a morte do redentor enforcado no hall do elevador, traçando um
paralelo com o filme 2001 – Uma Odisséia no Espaço,
de Stanley Kubrick.
Outras canções também
se destacavam, como “Samba de Verão 2”, de letra bem
poética; “Dia de Vitória”, sobre a passeata
dos cem mil e o tema jazzy “Azimuth”.
Em 1969, os Valle já estavam bem
à frente da maioria dos artistas do cenário brasileiro.
