The War Inside My Head: An Interview with Papangu
The musical, human, and artistic miracle that is the jazzy, progressive monstrosity also known as Papangu has again resurfaced amid chirping birdies and slippery lizards. For the uninitiated, they released what basically amounts to a modern avant-garde metal masterpiece with their insane debut, Holoceno, back in 2021, and have since managed to scale even mightier heights in the form of doing an alternate harsh-vocals take of one of that album's best tracks, which they then contributed to my 2022 compilation album. OK, so maybe not technically "mightier heights" (not sure that even works as a figure of speech), but nice of them. So, yeah. Good people.
However, this Friday they will be unleashing they new and somehow even crazier album, Lampião Rei via the great Repose Records. It's way jazzier, it's much less "metal-y" and yet somehow – and I kind of need to figure out how – turns out more aggressive and unnerving. A beautiful album, one of the most beautiful of this very ugly year, and a must listen/buy to anyone with a human mind. So, ahead of that blessed release I thought I'd pester my Brazilian buddies about the music that makes up their drunken tapestry, and it just randomly turned into one of my all-time installments of this music-appreciation series. Great people, wild music. Go get Lampião Rei.
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What was the first album you bought with your own money, and where did you buy it?
Raí: American Idiot, by Green Day. I bought it way back in 2005 in a Walmart in Orlando. My mom gifted me a Discman back in the day and gave me some cash to pick a CD of my choosing. I was 11 or 12 at the time, and my only musical reference, apart from what my parents listened to at home, was whatever was on MTV. I spent about an hour in the store, browsing through the options that caught my interest. I ended up with two finalists: Jay-Z’s Black Album and Green Day’s American Idiot. I went with American Idiot because it had more familiar tracks (I think a couple of them already had music videos playing nonstop on MTV). I immediately fell in love with the album and spent the rest of the trip reading its booklet to memorize all the lyrics (which I still remember to this very day).
Marco: The first album I ever got with my own money was Stabbing Westwards’ Darkest Days. If you were born into a middle class Brazilian family in the mid 1990s, you were probably bound to own a jailbroken Playstation 1 at some point, as you couldn’t afford anything other than pirated CDs. One of the games I got was Duke Nukem: Time to Kill, and it opens up with this ridiculous CGI cutscene where the main character shoots up hog-like cops in a L.A. strip club called Bootylicious. The soundtrack on that intro was a NIN-ripoff by Stabbing Westward called "The Thing I Hate." Nine-year old me was so impacted by the whole experience I had to get more of it, so I saved my monthly R$10.00 (a little under 2 dollars) allowance for a few months and asked my parents to buy me any Stabbing Westward CD they could find. Lo and behold, they found it at the bargain bin at the local record store.
Turns out that Darkest Days is a pretty solid concept record. Quite gothy, somewhat emo, indeed very reminiscent of Trent Reznor’s poppier stuff but still provided a bunch of hard hitting riffs and fun synth sounds in a logical, filler-free package. Holds up just fine today if you ignore the cybergoth lyrical material. There’s a bleak ass song in it called "Desperate Now" that was a big influence on how I wrote the intro to the final track in our debut album.
Pedro: I’m not quite sure here, but it was either a compilation of Deep Purple’s classics I bought at a Fnac store in São Paulo, or Ozzy Osbourne’s Under Cover, in which he recreated his own versions for classics such as: In My Life (The Beatles), Mississippi Queen (Mountain), 21st Century Schizoid Man (King Crimson), which I bought at a Lojas Americanas store in João Pessoa.
Rodolfo: It was either Aerosmith's Nine Lives (1997) or Blind Guardian's Battalions of Fear. There's a great chance it was also Queen's Greatest Hits. Anyhow, all of these have really been landmark albums when shaping my taste for vocal arrangements, glorious guitar solos, and a quirkiness or light-heartedness to writing music. Nowadays, I can only listen to Nine Lives out of these three. I bought it at the São Paulo Airport at a murderous price with some pocket money my aunt had given me. The other two were purchased from a small shop at the only mall we had in our hometown at the time.
Hector: By the Way by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I was already into rock music because of my father, and because of him I mostly heard the Beatles and U2 around the house while growing up. But then everything changed when I heard the lead single for the album, the self-titled By The Way, played on a radio station. I became obsessed with that tune. I searched around and whined until my parents bought me a bootleg compilation of modern rock that had By the Way in it from a guy who happened to sell bootleg CDs at the beach. That was quite common around here back in the day, actually. But that wasn’t enough. I wanted more. So I saved every penny from every source I could, gifts from family and etc, up until I had an astonishing amount of 32 reais and then I bought the full By the Way album at this local record store inside a mall. I can’t remember the shop’s name.
Buying that record sent me on a path of no return. Through that album I familiarized myself with John Frusciante’s guitar playing and through him I solidified my wish to become a guitar player. His playing is a big influence on me up until this day.
What 2-3 albums did you hear the most growing up?
Raí: The first Avenged Sevenfold song I ever heard was “Beast and the Harlot,” and I immediately fell in love with the band’s sound. I delved into their other albums and discovered the gem that is Waking the Fallen. To me, it perfectly represents the metalcore scene that emerged in the early 2000s, with intense growls, catchy choruses, and epic guitar solos—a combination that resonated with my teenage self. As I explored heavier music, I naturally encountered Sepultura’s Roots. It serves as the foundation upon which many modern metal bands were built. From start to finish, it’s a captivating album, and despite listening to it countless times, it never ceases to surprise me. I believe it will forever hold a place in my personal pantheon of all-time great albums. Another album that played a significant role during my adolescence was Metallica’s Master of Puppets. I dare say it’s responsible for the birth of Papangu! My passion for Metallica back then was so immense that I decided to form a cover band with Hector and Dennis, a drummer friend from our school days. The only missing piece was a bassist who shared our love for heavy music. Through a mutual friend, we connected with Marco, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Marco: I grew up listening to a lot of soul and disco music – that was the preferred soundtrack of my mom’s family, and I remember listening to a lot of Abba, Bee Gees, and Barry White every summer. Listening to disco bass lines was probably how the idea of becoming a bass player was conceived in my head, but that remained dormant for a good while. Bee Gees’ Greatest compilation was the record I listened to the most until I was 13. That was more or less the time I fell in love with Rush, then with Weather Report, then fell into the bass guitar technique rabbit hole and started devouring anything that had interesting bass playing. Someone on the Talkbass forums told me to check out Jamiroquai, and their psychedelic, faux environmentalist take on Stevie Wonder’s early 70s sound really captivated me then. It taught me a lot about playing in the pocket and taking the lead whenever necessary. Their Return of the Space Cowboy record kicks fucking ass.
All throughout my life, though, what remained consistent was my utter love for Yoko Shimomura’s soundtrack for the Squaresoft RPG The Legend of Mana. That soundtrack album is one of the only things I allow myself to be nostalgic for. I strongly recommend it even to people who have no intention of playing the game. Brilliant harmony work, wonderful melodies, and all composed within the limitations of the software – which means they had to be good enough to be repeated ad aeternum.
Pedro: Queen – Greatest Hits, Aerosmith – Greatest Hits (1973-1988), Blue Öyster Cult – Cities on Flame With Rock and Roll.
Rodolfo: There were several landmark albums in my early teenage years which could be mentioned. I used to walk to school with my Sony Discman and it took me about 20 minutes to get there at about 7:10am and slightly less to get back home. In short: it was a different album each day, short of the songs I didn't like in that particular album. I'd avoid repeating the same album for many days, but three of these did feature more frequently throughout the daily stroll to school: Nirvana's Nevermind, Queen's A Night at the Opera, and Blind Guardian's Nightfall in Middle-Earth.
Nevermind gave me just enough confidence to face each block and sidewalk with some wild adolescent bravery which I like to think I've kept to this day in my thirties. A Night at the Opera helped me go through some lazy mornings with its power and occasional light-heartedness—it kept me on my toes too. Nightfall in Middle-Earth, however, was the escape route from what felt like industrial lobotomy. Its whimsical theme and overblown conceptualisation of a fantasy world I was just reading would very easily erase the path ahead of me.
Hector: Red Hot Chili Peppers – By The Way, for sure, as mentioned above. I also remember being super excited when my mother bought my father a copy of The Beatles – 1, A Singles compilation. I memorized every word on that record and it quite literally changed my life too. I became a Beatles fan as early as five or six years old, I think. It's also worth mentioning Mestre Ambrósio – Fuá na Casa de Cabral. That record taught me a lot about Brazilian northeastern folk music. It was the first time I heard this kind of music being played in some sort of an electric style.
What albums taught you the most about the technical aspect of making music?
Raí: I’ll try to keep the list short and mention albums from a broad spectrum. I guess they would be: Return to Forever – Romantic Warrior; Mastodon – Crack the Skye; and Banda Black Rio – Maria Fumaça.
Marco: Going back to my beginnings as a bass player, the interplay displayed by Weather Report on their I Sing the Body Electric album was deeply inspiring. These guys were improving upon the formula set by Miles Davis’ Second Great Quintet, and then further by Miles’ electric band – the Bitches Brew era – so this was totally next-level shit. Passionate world-class musicians with a whole world of possibilities, open and undiscovered roads ahead of them, and taking loads of risks. I am not a world-class musician at all but this very idea of communicating with other musicians and striving for your very best in uncertain musical circumstances taught me a lot, or at least inspired me to find those moments.
From a compositional and technical aspect, I think I’ll mention Genesis’ The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, for its sheer youthful excess and insanely good songwriting, even despite the duds, and Cheer-Accident’s Introducing Lemon, also another record that uses its length to its benefit and manages to conceive an unique universe in a logical and weird sequence. Plus, it ends with the most mind blowing instrumental section I’ve ever heard in rock music to this very day. Man, I love Thymme Jones so much.
Pedro: Toninho Horta – Terra dos Pássaros, Taiguara – Imyra, Tayra, Ipy, and Moacir Santos – Coisas.
Rodolfo: Whatever has not been said about the technical masterclass of Frank Zappa's 70s albums is surely hiding beneath thousands of professional reviews out there. While my favourite album from that time is still Apostrophe ('), it was One Size Fits All which made me overlook the wackiness and focus on the part that wackiness plays in a wider and more complex arrangement for rock music.
Now, maybe onto something even weirder—in a good way—I have to mention Tom Waits' Rain Dogs. The technical aspects to be highlighted are manifold, but there are three which stand out to me regarding recording, writing, and performing music: (i) simply not caring about detuned pianos or guitars if the song is a banger; (ii) lyrics matter, even if they're really simple and objective; (iii) authenticity and viscerality: you have to mean it.
Finally, I'll second Marco's inclusion of Genesis' The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. It's a testament to peak musicianship, performance, technique, and authenticity. It's one of the few albums I dare say covers the full spectrum of emotions through curated timbres, harmonies, and lyrics.
Hector: I think I can name two. The first time I heard Frank Zappa’s Roxy & Elsewhere I became infatuated with this tune called "Echidna’s Arf (of You)." When I picked up my guitar in order to jam along I was taken aback by how well constructed that song was overall and how it seamlessly fades into another song. It rocks and it also grooves and it’s also weird. That’s the best kind of music. The other one is Fuá Na Casa de Cabral by Mestre Ambrósio, which I mentioned earlier. This record is hard to describe. It’s a mix of a lot of Northeastern Brazilian folk sounds like maracatu, ciranda e coco de roda but with a touch of psychedelia and rock music in it. They were shoehorned (IMO) in the same category as Chico Science & Nação Zumbi (whom I also love) as a manguebeat band but I don’t think of them like that at all. They use a lot of different instruments and experiment with weird shit like putting lots of guitar effects like delays and cavernous reverbs on a kind of fiddle we have around here called rabeca. Siba, the guy who plays the electric guitar, is another major influence for me.
What is the last album that absolutely shocked you?
Raí: I think O Último Ancestral Comum by Bríi. Bríi is a project by a Brazilian musician [and friend of the show! MM] named Caio Lemos and it aims to blend electronic music with black metal. This album in particular ended up being quite shocking for me because, even though I was already familiar with the band’s sound, the sudden appearance of lo-fi black metal in the middle of one of the tracks caught me completely off guard. Since then I can’t stop thinking about it.
Marco: Oh, the two PoiL Ueda albums that came out last year still haunt me. Deeply original, avant-prog arrangements of biwa music with plenty of dynamics and rhythmic madness. I gotta say I had overexposed myself to avant-prog to the point where listening to this stuff would usually give me a headache – which still applies to lower budget, digitally recorded albums from the late 80s and 90s – but the PoiL Ueda stuff is tremendous, never too abrasive and full of beautiful moments where Junko Ueda’s satsuma biwa and voice get to shine by themselves. I was lucky enough to catch them live and it’s so humbling to see musicians on that level performing this music. It was like watching Shogun on DMT.
Pedro: It was and still is a shock to me listening to Heraldo do Monte’s (Pernambuco) homonymous album from 1980. As a teenager, I used to listen to things such as Miles Davis – Bitches Brew, Mahavishnu Orchestra – Birds of Fire, and stuff like that, as well as a lot of prog-rock stuff such as Genesis, King Crimson, ELP and Frank Zappa. So when I found out that there was a virtuoso guitar player, songwriter and maestro born nearby where I live, my world turned upside down. He deserves a lot of credit for being such an inspiring guitar player without using any distortion, or barely any effects to achieve such a distinct sound.
Rodolfo: I've been listening to a lot of soft rock lately. I don't think these next two I'll mention have really shocked me, but I was somewhat taken aback by their curious arrangements, great use of reverb, and unpredictable, yet simple, chord progressions: Daryl and Oates' Abandoned Luncheonette (1972) and America's Hearts (1975).
What album relaxes you or centres you the most?
Raí: Silibrina – Estandarte.
Pedro: Haruomi Hosono – Watering a Flower.
Marco: It shifts. Right now Susumu Hirasawa – Kyuusai no gihou is my go-to for relaxation: it’s like a long and sweet yoga session in album format for me. Though I’m certain he’d hate that his music was described in such a trivial way.
Rodolfo: Tom Petty – Full Moon Fever (for now).
Hector: Grateful Dead – Dick's Picks Vol. 3. I am not among the world’s biggest deadheads but I do enjoy the band. This particular record was the first one from an extensive series of live records that I listened to and I memorized its pieces and bits. I think the jams and noodling are somewhat relaxing, although there are some energetic performances on this record.
What are the 2-3 albums you’ve listened to the most recently?
Pedro: Laura Nyro – Eli And The Thirteenth Confession, The Beatles – Abbey Road, Berliner Philharmoniker and Claudio Abbado – Debussy: Prélude à l’aprés-midi d’un faune.
Marco: I’ve rediscovered the beauty of Elephant9’s Greatest Show on Earth. They revisit the recording and mixing techniques of late 60s/very early 70s British jazz fusion records (think Soft Machine’s Fourth) but play a proggier version of that music with intense, intense evil fury. They also have one of the best rhythm sections ever, and their keyboardist sounds a little like Olivier Messiaen. The other two I’ve heard this week are the new Magdalena Bay record and Klark Sound’s What is Music. Killer production and songwriting on those two.
Rodolfo: Mingus – Mingus Ah Um, Sly and the Family Stone – There's a Riot Going On, Fito Paez – Lo Mejor de los Mejores.
Raí: Gen Hoshino – Pop Virus; Vauruvã – Por Nós da Ventania; Turnstile – Glow On.
Hector: Popol Vuh – Letzte Tage Letzte Nächte is on heavy rotation. It’s a great mix of krautrock with some pastoral themes and psychedelic elements. Os Mutantes – Jardim Elétrico, one of the best albums by one of the all time greatest Brazilian rock n roll bands. It’s a classic and I think everyone should listen to it. There are some Mutantes and Rita Lee albums from the 60’s and 70’s that are absolute bangers and part of the brazilian rock 101 guide; A Tribe Called Quest – The Low End Theory and The Pharcyde – Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde are also on heavy rotation. Funnily enough, I just checked the music app I use on my phone today and found out that the artist I listened to the most during 2024 so far has been Kendrick Lamar. I love weird and experimental hip hop with jazzy elements and these records I just mentioned are prime examples of that genre.
What album is grossly underrated?
Marco: Pretty much every single Kayo Dot work with the exception of Choirs of the Eye is criminally underappreciated. Toby Driver is one of the few living composers capable of conjuring his own universe of sound, every record its own little planet with its idiosyncrasies. Toby’s unique musical vocabulary functions as the laws of nature governing all of his discography, but not in a limiting way. Not a lot of people are capable of doing that; other than Christian Vander, James Ferraro, and Hermeto Pascoal, I can’t really easily name people who are in that league of originality outside of the classical music world. Shout out to his homage to Susumu Hirasawa: Plastic House on Base of Sky.
Pedro: I’d highly recommend listening to Pau Brasil’s Babel from 1994. The group has got some recognition later as being a pivotal contemporary instrumental group in Brazil, but this album in particular features the amazing Brazilian indigenous-music singer, researcher and songwriter, Marlui Miranda. I’d also recommend watching their live performance through this video:
Rodolfo: Maybe not so underrated by musicians and critics in Brazil, but definitely so elsewhere: Fagner's Orós (1977) was arranged by archwizard Hermeto Pascoal, and it still surprises me every now and then with its gritty and visceral tracks.
Hector: Hear me out: it’s Peter Criss’ solo album from the 1978 series of Kiss solo albums. That one got slammed hard and has always been. But I actually quite like it. I think it’s a very cool and relaxing and silly mix of soft rock, pop rock and blue-eyed soul that makes you whistle and tap your feet. It won’t change your life at all but I think it’s the most unjustly bashed album of all time and it would be funny to see if this album can be looked at in a less harsh light someday just like Black Sabbath – Born Again is nowadays.
What album would you recommend from your local scene?
Raí: I’d recommend Baleia Explode by Tela Azzu. The album was released in early 2024 and it really captivated me.
Marco: I don’t think João Pessoa has a scene anymore – there are small enclaves without a lot of cross-pollination between them, and no actual scene venues have survived the past 15 years. So rather than try to think of a representative work from the scene I’d rather recommend a forgotten record from a local composer – Fernando Falcão’s Memória das Águas. It blends field recordings and musique concrète techniques with afrobeat and a dozen of different Brazilian rhythms, boosted by strings, a water berimbau created by Fernando, and a brass section that reminds of Don Ellis’ late 60s stuff. Apparently Fernando exiled himself in France during Brazil’s military dictatorship, and I have no idea how the hell did he manage to get the budget to record something this ambitious in Europe. Good for him, probably shitty for the tiny label that put it out.
Rodolfo: Bicho-grilo's Bicho-Grilo (2017) is a lo-fi / indie prog masterpiece recorded by my brother Pedro (also from Papangu) in his bedroom.
Hector: Definitely Tela Azzu – Baleia Explode is the first one that comes to my mind. I’d also recommend Papa Mute – Papa Mute. Rodolfo and Pedro are in it. It’s a great album. There’s a song called "Fruta Fumo" that I love and I kinda forced those two to play on some Papangu gigs just because I wanted to hear it.
