SAO PAULO UNDERGROUND
Sauna: Um, Dois, Tres
Aesthetics
· Collaboration by Chicago ex-pat and Tortoise contributor Rob Mazurek and Brazilian musician Mauricio Takara.
So, you're a musician in Chicago who is known for working with some of the most creative musical minds in America and you meet a striking woman from Brazil and get married. Leaving behind urban America for a new rain-forested hometown, what do you do? In Rob Mazurek's case, you seek out a like-minded soul and proceed to make a striking, individual and utterly engrossing record.
Mazurek and Takara's work as Sao Paulo Underground has been categorized as jazz, but Sauna: Um, Dois, Tres is not an album that asks for or warrants such boundaries. Reflecting their vastly different geographical, cultural and musical inspirations and influences, the two men have sculpted an album that incorporates the spirit of exploration of ’70s jazz, the rhythms and melodies of Brazil and the abstract electronic experimentalism that exploded in the last decade all within the nomenclature of the most idealistic of the post rock deconstructionists. Or, less pretentiously, have made a record that kicks your ass and your synapses.
This is not world music, or jazz music, or experimental music – this is music emblematic of the 21st century, similar to the recent collabs between Kieran Hebden and Steve Reid. This is music that seamlessly binds traditions, genres and low and high art, aligning itself with nothing but the experiences of the people involved. Tortoise fans might dig into only a couple of tracks, Brazilerios might be disappointed at the lack of recognizable rhythms, but Sao Paulo Underground have laid out something grander than the sum of its parts. It’s an album to immerse yourself in, an album of riddles and challenges, but one which even upon first listen is rewarding, transporting and singular. And it only improves from there.
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