Given the news that we receive about Brazil daily, that the President will be impeached, that millions are sliding into poverty, that corruption is mining hope’s coal, a song could remind us of Brazil’s first commitment to leftist politics after years of dictatorships all the while also explaining us why Brazil is going through what it is going through. Which song? Brazilians produce many great musicians and songs but perhaps the very best song to tune to is Zeca Baleiro’s “Pastiche” and his singing that someone is told by an angel to stand “gauche!” or with the left but that this person was painted by life in gouache.
Baleiro’s song treats the fundamental contradiction that every citizen in every society has to live with: either doing the right thing or not and being reminded of when has or has not. It does it with lyrics that are resolutely urban and can mock a very sad situation that plagues most contemporary societies. Corruption is what is destroying Brazil and Baleiro sings us the corrupt, survival-obsessed, individual.
The song itself is the sort of samba that can be danced with one’s hands in the air or with each of one’s hands on one’s sides. He sings the song along with a woman’s voice (I can’t seem to find out who this woman is,) and the duo is incredible. The wind instruments are a great addition but it is the song’s rhythm that affects a listener the most. It is a song full of humor, though one should not forget that it is political humor and its reason for being is so that we treat the topic of contradicted and unproductive individualism seriously.
Listening to it will do wonders. It’ll put a fundamental contradiction to music. It’ll remind us that Bossa Nova was the sound of progress and that despite the pain that came after Bossa Nova, Brazilian musicians, Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso have always kept hope alive through song. It’ll remind us that human societies both regress and progress but what remains the same is one’s ability to stand in solidarity with the right principles. It’ll also remind us that a political song can be beautifully written enough to read like a poem.
I like to write pastiches
I like to eat pistachios
In a past life I was a whirling dervish
Currently the life I lead is full of satire
An Angel came to me and said: ‘Gauche!’
Life came and painted me in gouache
I dance with a doll
Dressed in a Versace suit
I used to own a chop shop
And dress like an Apache during Carnival
I played a minor character in the movie “A Revanche”
Shared a scene or two with Irene Ravache
All great horses bray
Every scoundrel makes mistakes
I had a band but it had some umph
Nobody’ll step on me, I’m no doormat
I worked from Sunday to Sunday
I’m very fancy, I eat sushi and quiches
Though when I lived at Largo do Arouche
I only ate sandwiches
I became famous by starring in trash movies
It was a horrendous life, O God, o my!
Like everyone else, I do a dream
I’d like to be John Malkovich
Author: Adolf Alzuphar
