Pedro Kastelijns – “Olhos da Raposa”

Got a brand-new cut today from Pedro Kastelijns, that captures the spirit of Tropicália and recasts it for a new age. The Brazilian songwriter melds ‘60s folk leanings with a deconstructed pop approach that’s broken and reformed. On “Olhos da Raposa” he lounges in the sway of his strings before they’re consumed by static and set adrift on a frequency of foam that disperses into the atmosphere. The songwriter lets his work be digested by the fray, glitching into cubits and twisting the tape into curls. It’s easy to see how he’s fallen in with the experijmental enclave around Boogarins, borrowing gear from the band to record his debut Som das Luzis over the last few years.

The song, inspired by an encounter with a native Brazilian fox called, “Raposinha do Cerrado” reminds me of a more refined version of reminds me of a more refined version of Columbian group Las Malas Amistates, though it seems an unlikely influence. Kastelijns pegs the origins of the track thusly, “I was really into ‘Dorival Caymmi’ eloquent voice and nylon guitar songs, ‘Claudinho e Bochecha’ sweet Baile Funk beats and some other weird sounds… I wanted to create a song that merged these two worlds. So I wrote these very different parts first only guitar and voice, then started building it up on Ableton, putting all these parts together and then making sure that I created bridges between them. It starts as a mess but then I go on figuring it out, cutting and pasting. I knew that the way I was playing the nylon would create some friction with the drum machine in a very pleasant way so I putted in the middle because I knew it would create a good momentum. It all goes with a lot of intuition, playfulness, experimentation and the confidence in some ideas that just sound right for you, and some friction also!” The album arrives December 6th from OAR.

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photo credit: Aino Lehtonen