Caetano Veloso

It’s hard to find a bigger name in Brazilian music. João Gilberto? Antonio Carlos Jobim? Milton Nascimento? Maybe. Elis Regina? Gilberto Gil? Jorge Ben Jor? Close, but not quite. Tom Zé? For a certain audience perhaps. Carmen Miranda? How old are you? In the wider world, Caetano Veloso has been the representative figure for Brazilian music for several decades now. Even though Gilberto’s & Jobim’s bossas might be the representative sound, Veloso is the figure who seems to have broken through to non-Lusophone audiences.

Born in 1942 in Santo Amaro, Bahia, Caetano Emanoel Viana Teles Veloso was the fifth son of a postal official and a mother who lived to the ripe age of 105. He also helped name his younger sister, the singer Maria Bethânia. Drawn to the arts, Veloso planned a career in film but, like many young Brazilians, was carried away by the bossa nova craze that set Brazilian music on its modern path. As a young musician, he fell in with some fellow political and musical troublemakers, the tropicalistas (Gilberto Gil, Nara Leão, Tom Zé, Gal Costa, and Rita Lee, Sérgio Dias and Arnaldo Baptista of Os Mutantes). In the oft-told tale, Veloso shook up the by-then conservative bossa nova movement by incorporating non-Brazilian musics into the mix, angered the military dictatorship, and was exiled to London with Gil for three years before returning triumphantly—artistically at least as the dictatorship had another decade in it—as one of the leading figures of MPB. In the 1980s he began to be recognized internationally, which firmly set him up as the most noted Brazilian musician of his generation. His more than 50-year recording career is full of hallmark albums of Brazilian music (including seven which ended up on Rolling Stone Brazil’s top 100 Brazilian albums list), he got Jorge Ben Jor a recording contract when the industry had given up on him, and became a globally celebrated artist. Yet despite more than four years of blogging on Brazilian music, I hadn’t listened to much three early albums. Time to rectify that.

But first: honesty time. As a non-Lusophone, I generally only get snatches of verbal meaning through awkward free online translation. Sometimes that’s not a big deal. Jorge Ben and Tom Zé seem to have some fine lyrics, but their primary contribution is formal musical innovation more than literary meaning. Like Dylan, Veloso has always been a word hound. His music absolutely has the formal smarts and hooks to lure in an Anglophone, but his words clearly matter in understanding his art to an extent that is not true of Ben or even his fellow tropicalista Gilberto Gil. That voice—intense, yet lulling, like the ocean this self-proclaimed beach lover has seen and heard many times—sits at the center of his sound, so it’s hard to ignore the significance of his verbal meaning. Translations help, but as I’ve said before, I find them of limited value. It’s nice knowing what an artist is singing about. It can increase or decrease the pleasure. But reading a translation alongside the singing doesn’t get me any closer to what really works about the vocal art. With a translated book, I’m losing something, but I still read the words in English. With music, I read the words, but the ears hear, in this case, Portuguese. There’s a gap between sound and meaning translation can’t quite jump. I still like to translate some, but I’m not kidding myself that a translation helps me to figure out if Veloso’s supporters are right that he’s one of the greatest songpoets of our time. So, as with Baco Exu do Blues, I know I’m not getting Veloso in a crucial way, and whatever my judgments, they are even more suspect than usual. But that music still matters, and understanding Veloso even somewhat seems nearly a moral obligation for someone who likes to opine publicly on Brazilian music. The more I learn to hear his music in its historical context, the more I appreciate what he and his friends accomplished. 

Veloso’s catalogue is vast. He has soundtracks, collaborative albums and live albums in addition to his regular studio solo recordings. I’ve skipped most of his collaborations and soundtracks, and only included about half of his live albums. I believe all his regular studio solo albums are present. One final comment. I put almost all the albums below onto a massive playlist. When I hit shuffle, even tracks from the ‘bad’ albums often sounded pretty good in the context. So of course I went back and re-listened, even if the weaker grades made sense. It’s a reminder that even ‘bad’ Veloso is pretty good.

Gal Costa and Caetano Veloso, Domingo (1967) – A solid debut with close collaborator and friend Costa. In the shadow of what came after, it seems rather timid: a fairly straight bossa nova album with none of the stylistic daring that the two, with the tropicalistas, will unleash before the year closed out. But it’s also confident, with the stronger songs more reminiscent of João Gilberto’s coolly intense early bossa music than the showier stuff being popularized by Elis Regina and others at the time. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Caetano Veloso (a.k.a. Tropicália) (1968) – Tropicália actually kicked off in 1967, but the first wave of albums didn’t arrive until 1968. This triumph, along with Gilberto Gil’s second album and the Tropicália Ou Panis Et Circensis collaboration, are shots fired across the bow of the bossa nova establishment as well as the military dictatorship. The lead track, “Tropicália”, is a statement of purpose musically and lyrically looking toward Brazil’s musical past as it builds its future. Inspired by Mário de Andrade’s modernist cannibalism, Veloso and the tropicalistas reached out beyond Brazil to absorb influences while transforming them into something deeply Brazilian. Brazilian musics collide with avant-European dissonance, rock psychedelia, and showtune brazenness for a heady, deep mix that disorients and delights. A classic. Grade: A

Caetano Veloso, Caetano Veloso (a.k.a. Irene) (1969) – Recorded while under house arrest, Veloso’s third album builds on the innovations of the second. Lyrics foreshadow the dislocation of the exile he and Gilberto will soon experience. Rogério Duprat’s dense arrangements darken the mood and fill even the upbeat songs with a discomfiting undercurrent. Veloso’s songs are smoother, less jumpy than on his second album, and his singing grows more confident. In retrospect, this is where Veloso demonstrates he’ll be more than a flash in the pan. Grade: A

Caetano Veloso, Caetano Veloso (a.k.a. A Little More Blue) (1971) – The exile album. Like Gil’s similar effort, these songs are sung in English and exude the disconsolate life of a child of sunny Brazil stuck in perpetually overcast England. But where depressed Gil still had buoyancy, Veloso seems to sink in the boggy mire. Too many of these songs wander purposelessly, which is appropriate as exile metaphor, but not the best listening experience. Only two match his best work. The title track looks wistfully back to his days of house arrest where at least he was in Brazil. The touchingly wicked love letter to his sister “Maria Bethânia” manages to work up some of his playfulness even if it goes on too long. The rest fits the mood and the context, but doesn’t transcend them or their limitations. Grade: C+ 

Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso, Barra 69: Ao Vivo Na Bahia (1972) – Released from house arrest, Gil and Veloso promptly head to the stage and quickly earn the ire of the authorities who hoped imprisonment would scare them into silence. This wretched sounding live album documents one of these shows before the military dictatorship rounded them up again and kicked them out of the country. The poor sound quality renders this one mainly of historical interest, but that “mainly” counts. The performances are lively and make you wish you were there, and it’s got two geniuses in their prime, so I can actually imagine listening to it again. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Transa (1972) – No longer an exile from rua principal, or any Brazilian rua for that matter, Veloso returns home rejuvenated. After the dour fourth album, this one picks up where Caetano Veloso/Irene left off. Rock influenced, but not rock, he continues to blaze new trails for MPB. The title translates as “Fuck”, but given the dictatorship’s censorship, I’m guessing it’s not that blunt. Where exile seems to continue are in the lyrics, most of which are in English. As a whole, it’s one of Veloso’s most accomplished albums. The song never let up as Veloso ends exile, but not alienation. It sums up his early career and sets the stage for his adventurous 1970s. Grade: A

Caetano Veloso and Chico Buarque, Caetano e Chico Juntos E Ao Vivo (1972) – A triumphant return home where Veloso makes common cause Buarque who’d been on the opposite side of the tropicália/bossa nova feud. Shared left politics and opposition to the dictatorship can’t quite overcome aesthetic divisions that are still present, however. Grade: C

Caetano Veloso, Araçá Azul (1973) – His most experimental and difficult album. Not an easy listen. Tracks like “Sugar Cane Fields Forever” are impressive in some kind of cold, technical way, but compare Veloso’s art trips here with what Tom Zé’s was doing about the same time on Todos Os Olhos. Where Zé’s avant remains firmly rooted in songcraft so that the pop and the art rub against other with triumphant tension, Veloso struggles to escape ‘science project’ status. But as much as I—like, apparently, Brazil’s public—hated it at first, I’ve come around. Eventually his melodies break through the jags, and at this point his impish intelligence is irrepressible. So what initially just sounds like messing around in the studio coheres into something recognizable as great Veloso music. It’s still not as good as Zé’s songful avant, and I’m glad he didn’t keep going down this path, but when he did it here, he did it well. Grade: A-

Caetano Veloso, Jóia (1975) – Veloso bounces back from a commercial flop with a tunes album that leavens the experimentalism into its mix. The first three on side one and the first two on the second side are among his strongest songs ever. Fetching melodies are decorated with smart instrumentation and arty tricks. But after that he falls into ballads that are solid without approaching his mesmerizing peak. Overall he’s in fine form continuing the rock-not-rock MPB moves of Transa while playing with form and sound without letting those tricks get in the way of those melodies and that voice. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Qualquer Coisa (1975) – Quieter and softer than Jóia. The unadorned songs are built around Veloso’s gorgeous voice, but that voice draws you into the words, which beg the question of meaning. But the music still speaks past the language barrier. Considering eight of the 12 tracks are covers, he probably didn’t have two albums in him that year. Most of the covers are ace, but did we really need three Beatles songs in a row? Combine the best songs here—”A Tua Presença Morena”, “Da Maior Importância”, the Ben cover—and put them with the strongest from Jóia, and you would have had another classic. But I supposed two pretty great ones is decent compensation. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Gal Costa, Gilberto Gil and Maria Bethânia, Doce Bárbaros (1976) – On paper this is a juggernaut. But like most live documents the excitement of the show doesn’t quite translate. Much of it is indeed terrific. The cover of Milton Nascimento’s “Fé Cega, Faca Amoliada” turns the song from an intricate funk into a chaotic celebration that thrillingly threatens to fall apart. “Pássaro Proibido” slinks along satisfyingly. Since most of the songs were written for this collaboration, the album isn’t simply an afterthought to their careers, but it does leave you craving the extra quality control studios can bring, because this sounds like it could have been a classic with a little more focus. Maybe I should track down the documentary of the event. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Muitos Carnavais (1977) – Compilation of carnival tracks, only one of which seems to have appeared on another album. Frevos and samba marches. That kind of stuff. Bahian guitar and Veloso’s voice dominate. How much you get out of this depends how much carnival music you can take in one setting. Too much gets too frothy for me. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Bicho (1977) – Inspired by a trip to Nigeria with Gilberto Gil, Veloso gets funky. Not as impressive an appropriation of African music as Gil’s Refavela of the same year, it’s still pretty good and the closest Veloso came to making a dance record. The funk recedes as the album goes on and he returns to the ballad ground that is becoming his primary mode, but those rhythms provide momentum that keep the fun going strong. Grade: A-

Maria Bethânia and Caetano Veloso, Ao Vivo (1978) – Decent set with sister Maria. Arrangements lean toward upscale, jazzy lounge. The two singers are in fine form. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Muito (Dentro da Estrela Azulada) (1978) – A transitional album.  Veloso is still playing with form, shifting from style to style, but it’s quieter and softer, pointing to a future where his music will be smoothed out and his voice and songwriting firmly hold the center of his art. It’s liveliest on his slick cover of Ben’s “Quem Cochicha o Rabo Espicha” and the Gil co-write “São João, Xangô Menino.” The ballads aren’t bad, but they hint at the problems to come in his ’80s music. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Cinema Transcendental (1979) – For his final album of the decade Veloso leaves behind his more experimental past and shifts into mature mode. He still writes musically smart songs, but he’s clearly songs first at this point. Arrangements, melodies, etc. serve the song rather than being elements to play with as he explores how far he can bend Brazilian song form. And if that sounds like a backhanded compliment, it’s not. After some initial resistance—formal smarts are the easy way in when you can’t get the verbal content—I’ve learned to hear this as the great album others have told me it is. The cover has Veloso laying on the beach staring toward the eternity of an ocean horizon fits the mood here perfectly. Serene songs drift by unhurriedly as Veloso revels in the beauty of life as well as the melancholy the pursuit of it often brings. Superficially less ambitious than the albums that precede it, Cinema Transcendental nonetheless achieves its title by celebrating the ecstasies of the mundane. Grade: A-

Caetano Veloso, Outra Palavras (1981) – But the thing about song albums is you have to have the songs to pull them off. An album like Araçá Azul can work despite flaws in part because the textures, structural games, etc., can tickle your ears. But once you simplify and put the songs out front you have less wiggle room. Softer and less intense than Cinema Transcendental, this sometimes veers toward the easy listening mush that ’80s MPB tended to. But veering toward isn’t arrival, and there are still enough melody and voice to get this stuff across even if the end result doesn’t feel titanic in the way his albums mostly had for 14 years. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Cores, Nomes (1982) – But the thing about song albums is you have to have the songs to pull them off. An album like Araçá Azul can work…wait. This sounds familiar. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Uns (1983) – But the thing about song albums is you have to have the songs to pull them off. An album like…aw crap. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Velô (1984) – I’ll give him this. He’s not repeating himself. His most vibrant and engaged album since Cinema Transcendental. But it still sucks. The songs never cohere. The ’80s production adds an extra slice of cheese. A true rarity: a skippable Veloso album. Grade: C-

Caetano Veloso, Caetano Veloso (1986) – But the thing about song albums is…oh for crying out loud. Grade: C+

Caetano Veloso, Totalmente Demais (1986) – Veloso gets that the “live” in live album needs to mean something. So he packs his with covers and other non-album tracks, and he brings it attitude-wise. Where so much of his ’80s work struggles to get past pleasant, here he has some of the impish charisma that helped make him such a central figure in Brazilian music. Even the quiet tunes burst with energy. However nondescript his studio work had become in recent years, at least live he still seemed a vital artist. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Caetano (1987) – Marginally more engaged than most of his decade’s work, he occasionally arouses the old passions (“Eu Sou Neguinha?”) thanks to a renewed interest in rhythms, but mostly it trades in diminishing returns. Quality stuff in its way, but also the sound of treading water in poorly aged ’80s sonics. Grade: C+

Caetano Veloso, Estrangeiro (1989) – Working with avant-nerds from NYC, Veloso enters the American market with his strongest album since Cinema Transcendental. Joined by Brazilian-raised American Arto Lindsay and his Ambitious Lovers collaborator Peter Scherer (as well as Bill Frisell and Marc Ribot on some tracks), Veloso performs with a verve reminiscent of his great experimental ’60s and ’70s albums. Where most of his ’80s songs just sort of lay there, these jump and twist and slice while maintaining the post-samba cool. Veloso takes risks again rather than just coasting on his talent. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Circuladô (1991) – Where Estrangeiro sometimes bore more the imprint of Ambitious Lovers than Veloso, here he seems in charge again. Lindsay and some of his NYC pals are still there, but the sound is pure Veloso. Helps that Lindsay’s production is clearer and fuller than the sometimes muffled sound on the predecessor. But the real victory is Veloso’s contributions. This is the strongest set of songs he’s delivered since Cinema Transcendental, and even better is the singing which shakes off the lassitude of the ’80s with a clear, intense performance. Arrangements play up the oddness of his music and counterpoint the beauty of his melodies and singing viciously if subtly. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil, Tropicália 2 (1993) – Revisiting the glorious past is always tricky. You’ll never recapture what made it glorious. So this Veloso/Gil collab celebrating their tropicália moment 25 years after won’t convince you it’s equal to that breakthrough. What it will do is remind you that both artists were bigger than that moment. They’ve grown. Matured without getting boring. Deepened music that was pretty smart in the first place. And, Brazilians that they are, they’ve never lost sight of the centrality of beauty to their art. Heck. Sometimes I prefer listening to this rather than their late ’60s triumphs. Not often, but given those peaks, sometimes says a lot. Grade: A-

Caetano Veloso, Fina Estampa (1994) – After three records that jolted his career back to life, Veloso settles back into something more familiar. NYC sonics are gone. The quieter sounds of the ’80s records returns. But Veloso never sounds complacent. He remains an exceptional singer who knows how to get a melody across. Here he covers Latin American classics but brings Brazilian gentleness to ballads that sells them better than Latin romanticism sometimes does. Not as bracing as the three that precede it, but the sound of a restless artist still exploring what kind of music he can make. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Livro (1997) – Sublime. Apotheosizing the revitalization of his art, Veloso brings together the sharper rhythms of the previous few albums with his intensely calm voice and levitating melodies for his strongest album since his peak. The contrast with most of his ’80s work is clear. That music wasn’t just soft, but slack. Here everything feels light and airy, but also tough with arrangements that never go limp. Veloso revels in the beauty of books, celebrates the musical past that helped make his then current Brazil possible without forgetting the crimes his country will never fully overcome. Within our dystopian moment, the joy and beauty of this record are a startling reminder that the world before 2000 promised a different future than the one we got. Grade: A

Caetano Veloso, Prenda Minha (1998) – Another strong live album. Veloso’s secret is he doesn’t seem to think live albums are cash grabs or fillers between studio releases. A live album is a chance to capture the art he does in person as surely as studio albums capture the art he does there. From covers to differing arrangements to oddball selections, his live albums include all kinds of savvy tricks to avoid retread. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Omaggio A Frederico E Giulietta – Ao Vivo (1999) – In 1997, Frederico Fellini’s sister invited vocal fan Veloso to a tribute concert in San Marino. The result is this homage to Fellini and actress/spouse Giulietta Masina. Taking up his own songs, Brazilian classics and some from Fellini’s movies, he pens a sonic love letter. Tight, spare accompaniment from Jorge Helder (bass), Jaques Morelenbaum (cello), Carlos Balla (drums) and Luiz Brasil (guitar) supports the melodies and Veloso’s voice while still providing enough musical interest to be more than just backdrop. Veloso contends he wasn’t on top of his game vocally this evening, but whatever technical flaws in his singing, he’s never sung as warmly or lovingly. Not as historically significant as his early work, but there is no better showcase for his artistry than this late career display of mastery. Grade: A+

Caetano Veloso, Noites do Norte (2000) – Not bad by any means, but the closest to boring he’s been since before Estrangeiro. The performances aren’t phoned in as some of his ’80s records felt, but it does feel like he’s not really challenging himself. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, A Foreign Sound (2004) – One of his most acclaimed albums in the Anglophone world, and surely that has nothing to do with the fact that he sings in English, right? I resisted at first because I was a ‘real’ Brazilian music fan and Jorge Morelenbaum’s string arrangements tend a tad too lush for my tastes. But, really, this fits with nicely with his work since 1989 and is a good companion piece to the Latin covers on Fina Estampa. And because I’m a Yank, I find myself preferring this tour through the States’ musical legacy. Veloso shows love and deconstruction are necessary partners in good art, and of course he sings the manure—intentionally polite word for intentionally polite music—out of it. There are missteps. Shoulda lost the guitar solo on “Come as You Are”. The Talking Heads cover is too obvious. “Feelings” can’t be saved. But he was made for the great American songbook, and, outsider that he is, he shows Tin Pan Alley and its cultural rivals really are neighbors in that songbook. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Cinema Olympia: Caetano Raro & Inédito 67-74 (2006) – Fascinating vault dive from his peak period. Especially early on, these songs are wilder and more daring than what ended up on record back then. But in almost every case you can hear why the tracks didn’t make the cut: a lack of focus, stuff that doesn’t quite jell, etc. In other words, for an archeological project it’s tremendous in how it helps you hear avenues not taken on the official releases. Essential for fanatics and scholars. But as an album, a listening experience? Well, as a guy who has spent the last few months obsessing over this stuff, that’s hard to answer. At the end of that process, it’s fascinating and fun enough. At the beginning? Not so much when the official product was so on point. On some abstract level, I could probably justify upping this grade a notch or two, but I’m not going to. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Cê (2006) – In the ’80s, Veloso’s art got stale. But since reviving himself in 1989, he’s found ways to keep old tricks sounding fresh. Here he teams with son Moreno—who had recently made a splash with Dominico Lancellotti and Kassin in the +2 projects—guitarist Pedro Sá, drummer Marcello Callado and bassist Ricardo Dias Gomes for new tricks. Tapping alternative rock the way he’d tapped the spirit of the Beatles in his tropicália years is a daring move for an icon who could just coast impressively. Nothing since Araçá Azul has sounded so far from his norm. Yet ambition doesn’t equal result. The problem is Veloso and the material are mismatched. Beatles melodicism fused easily with Brazilian musics, but grungy alternative rock tends dour, so those airy flights of ecstatic melody upon which Veloso built his career struggle to take off here. The buzzy electric guitar often distracts from the delicate intensity of his voice, and the relatively straight rock rhythms don’t suit his songwriting. Or maybe the songs and melodies just aren’t up to snuff. The ’80s records were duller, but more successful, because even in rote mode, Veloso could spin out passable competence. Here he struggles. A dozen or so listens in, I’ve come to appreciate a handful of these, but that’s a lot of work for pretty meager payoff. Grade: C

Caetano Veloso, Zii E Zie (2009) – Markedly better attempt at alt-rock with the same team. Here Veloso sounds more comfortable with the music. The instrumentation doesn’t compete with his voice. His songwriting meshes with the arrangements. Rhythms get more samba and funky, and he even throws in an actual one on “Ingenuidade”. The marginal improvements on the songs here compared to Cê make all the difference. Not great Veloso, but something you could enjoy hearing again. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Ao Vivo Caetano Zii E Zie (2011) – Whatever problems Cê and Zii E Zie had are resolved here. Once again, Veloso shows that his live albums are rarely just throwaways. It helps that he can draw from his larger catalog of songs. “Irene” and “Maria Bethânia” are just better than anything he wrote for those two albums. But even the stuff from his alt-rock albums loosens ups and shines a little more here, and loose and shiny fits him. Grade: B

Caetano Veloso, Abraçaço (2012) – What’s that about third times around? Veloso finally sounds comfortable in his (temporary) alt-rock skin. He sings effortlessly over music that he struggled to express through earlier. His band—the same troupe as the previous two albums—brings together rock and Brazil without the awkwardness of earlier efforts. The secret, of course, is that it’s the most Brazilian of the three albums, so Veloso knows what to do. He uses the rock elements to make his music rather than trying to force his music into those formal constraints. Some of the playfulness of his tropicália work is present even as he explores dark themes (as he did then, too). When he slows it down, the somberness isn’t dreary or dour but simmers calmly with a mournful anger as he recounts the crimes his country (and others) are capable of. In other words, it’s what you expect from a good Veloso record. Grade: B+

Caetano Veloso, Moreno Veloso, Zeca Veloso and Tom Veloso, Ofertório Ao Vivo (2018) – Document of the 2017 tour that brought together father and sons. The CD version compacts it to 14 tracks, but the streaming one goes all in with 28. Unsurprisingly, they mostly play Dad’s stuff, but he makes it a family affair by including scion songs, and in this company the kids don’t sound so bad. Unfortunately that’s because the paterfamilias isn’t at his best. Caetano has been accused of being soft, but beneath the calm of his best music is an intensity that resists limp. Here the accusation lands. Whatever personal warmth this tour generated for family and audience fails to get across the recording barrier. The uptempo ones are merely passable recreations of studio success while the slow ones mostly drag. Caetano is normally a master of the live album format. Here he’s just boring. Grade: C+

Caetano Veloso and Ivan Sacerdote, Caetano Veloso & Ivan Sacerdote (2020) – Nine catalog songs rerecorded with Veloso joined by young clarinetist Sacerdote. The two met at a party, hit it off and decided to make an album. There’s no denying the quality of the music, but there’s nothing to really separate it from the originals. Would have been really fun to hear at that party, however. Grade: B-

Caetano Veloso, Meu Coco (2021) – From Estrangeiro to Abraçaço, Veloso relentlessly and restlessly pushed his art. But in the nine years since that he turned 70 and that run ended, he seems to have lost some steam. No new studio songs. Mediocre live albums that seemed more autumnal retrospectives than new art. So this modest retread is a late career surprise in two ways. First, he sounds comfortable with himself on a studio album in a way he hasn’t since A Foreign Sound if not Livro. The alt-rock trilogy was admirable, but also sounded like Veloso was struggling to adapt to a new sonic world. Second, even though this is the ‘laziest’ studio album he’s done since Noites do Norte, he nails it because he sounds committed. Some of these songs could easily fit onto his classic ’70s albums. His voice has lost a smidge of its transcendence, but the human fits the humane in here: his love of Brazil’s music old and new, his hatred of its politics, the ambivalence that the old always have as their world and lives disappear. But as an oldster he also gets to sing to his newest grandkid with a tenderness youngs probably couldn’t pull off. Sure many of the stories, and melodies, you’ve heard before. Olds repeat themselves. But some youngs haven’t figured out that not all repetition is nostalgia. It reminds us that if the old days weren’t always good, they were that sometimes, and when the current days aren’t good either, we can remember the olds got through it, so maybe we will, too. Grade: A-