Tanto Tempo

Gilberto, Bebel

album cover

Next-Generation Sultriness from Brazil

It took an electronica-savvy producer from Yugoslavia named Mitar Subotić (1961–1999) to help Brazil get its groove back in the 1990s. Suba, as he was known, came to Brazil in 1990 on a UNESCO scholarship. Enchanted with the country's music, he hoped to become a DJ or a studio remixer. He wrote songs and theater works, and quickly wormed into the arty São Paulo underground. Word of his intricate percussion loops and electronic adaptations of bossa nova spread, and within a few years he was collaborating with an elite circle of artists including Bebel Gilberto, daughter of the legendary singer and guitarist João Gilberto. Suba had nearly finished his work on this album when, in November 1999, a fire broke out in his home studio; he died trying to rescue a briefcase full of master tapes and computer files.

Suba's sleek backdrops suggested a way for Brazilian music to move forward, or at least take a step beyond the prison of '60s kitsch. Of the many singers he worked with, Bebel Gilberto was the best equipped to fully realize and extend the inspiration—she's got cool restraint in her DNA. The combination of his cosmopolitan rhythms and her sultry, classically coy Brazilian voice makes Tanto tempo one of the most intensely pleasurable listening experiences to emerge during the year 2000.

Gilberto is no radical—a spin through her sleepy, wistful rendition of Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Summer Samba (So Nice)" will confirm that. But she's not a Luddite, either. She's conversant in the choppy rhythms of clubland, and able to connect its undulating pulses to old-school bossa nova and other not-so-distant rhythmic relatives. And regardless of the derivation of the groove, Gilberto maintains, throughout, a kind of nature-preserve serenity: When things are really cooking, as on the acoustic-guitar samba "Sem contenção," Gilberto seems to float lazily along, removed from the frenzy. She sings everything as though deep in contemplation, and this gives tunes like "Alguem" rich contrast: The beat has its share of jarring syncopations while the wispy overlapping layers of vocals suggest a surreal dream sequence in a film.

Genre: World, Brazil
Released: 2000, Six Degrees
Key Tracks: "Tanto tempo," "Sem contenção," "Alguem."
F.Y.I.: For more Suba, check out both São Paulo Confessions and Tributo, which features a percussion-plus-loops performance with drummer João Parahyba.
Catalog Choice: Bebel Gilberto
Next Stop: Morelenbaum2/Sakamoto: Casa
After That: Moreno Veloso: Music Typewriter
Book Pages: 310–311