Week 4 & 5: Oh so cultural

Hey all

It's time for another São Paulo update! Last time I had decided to post an update once a week. That was two weeks ago. Once every two weeks is fine too.


So these past to weeks have been a lot about going to shows and what not. I started off by going to another one of my landlords Monday night shows. The music was the same but the band itself was as spontaneous as I had first imagined it, making it all very much worth it coming down again.

The next day after work I headed down to Rafa's place to get my haircut. I opted for the same style as before but shorter and thus more summery. He did a bang up job for an amateur hairdresser if I say so myself.

Tin Tin

Thursday was the day I had been looking forwards to the most that week as I would be going to a live show of one of my favorite bands of old: Cansei de Ser Sexy. I met up with Joice, Carolina and Henry before the show and we had a few drinks and a few laughs. Good thing too because drinks at the hall were absurdly expensive. The show itself was their first show in São Paulo sinds years, making it a sort of homecoming concert (the band hails from São Paulo). Eventhough this was the fourth time I had seen them, this gig had a certain quality to it I had not witnessed in their show before. I'm guessing it had something to do with the 'homefield advantage' they possessed that night. Also it was the longest show I had ever seen them play. After the gig we took a cab down to Rua Augusta where we continued the night.

On our way to the concert

Joice, Henry and Carolina at the gig

The band

The next day There was another party, this time at my own house. It was huge! Many people came, music was played, moves were busted, booze was drunk! And I slept through it all. I do not know how, as I was looking quite forward to this party, but it happened. Well actually I have a vague notion of how it happened, being really really tired being a major factor in my equation. All in all, it was a shame. My landlords told me it was 'batshit insane'.

But not to worry! The next night I went out to Rua Augusta again where I partied a while with Joice, Henry, Raffa and an old friend of his, Boca. As per usual, it was all extremely fun and 'gezellig'.

I had reserved that sunday to get some more sleep as I seemed to be needing it. My landlords would have non of it though, and dragged me to this jazz orchestra show Nahor was playing in. The orchestra would be playing songs from an album originating from the 70s. Apparently, the album had only recently been getting worldwide attention due to some American DJ finding one of the songs of the album by accident and remixing it. The show itself was quite amazing and had an intense 'Brazilian samba chill' vibe going on.

Forgot the dudes name but it was some fine listening

Monday would not be my day of rest either as once again I headed out to Nahor's Monday night jazz band at The Orleans. This time I attended the show with Joice and my dear friend from Amsterdam, Silvia. She was in town for a bit before heading out further into the country for some anthropological research. It was great seeing her again and it was great to see both of them enjoyed the show.

Silvia and I at The Orleans

Tuesday was my day of rest. It was also the day that official word got out that Chemical Music Festival got canceled. Obviously this bummed me out.

The next day I had lunch with Silvia and we did some snooping around town for some books for her. This was the last time we would meet in São Paolo as she was heading out the next day but I promised to visit her in her cute little house when I got the chance.

The next evening I met up with Henry at this super super wicked cultural center called SESC Pompeias. It used to be an old factory of some sort but now all the storage houses housed some cool cultural thingamajig, from theater stages to concert stages to a brewery to a library to a swimming pool to a indoor fireplace hippie circle thing. It was all kinds of cool. The reason I was there that day was to see a live show by Dean & Britta. They had taken 13 of Andy Warhol's most beautiful screen tests and written songs for them. The music was great, but the stories of the people on the screen were probably what I enjoyed most. How these people's lives intertwined with Andy's, how they rose and fell, it was all very amazing. The screen tests included famous people as well, like Dennis Hopper and Lou Reed.

 

The band playing to Dennis Hopper's Screen Test

Friday was a relatively uneventful day. My workday had been canceled due to personal issues on their side, leaving the day wide open for me to slack around and try to get a tan. At night I met up with Rafa and a friend of his, Flamarion, at a burger joint right around the corner of my house. It was an 50s America style place and the burgers were actually quite nice. After telling Rafa and Flamarion about my knowledge of cachaça (Brazilian liqueur made from fermented sugarcane) they had a little freak out and opted we all go to Flamerion's house (who turned out to live around the corner aswell ) and taste some of what according to the Brazilian Playboy magazine was the #1 cachaça in the world. And truth be told, it was quite good.

The next day Henry and Joice wanted to take me to a little artisans market downtown where they sold all kinds of stuff from vintage phones to hand made thingamabobs. At the center of the market was a little food court type place with stands selling all kinds of Brazilian foods. Here I had the best brigadeiro (Brazilian chocolate sweet) I ever had. On our way out we passed by a second hand bookstore which funnily enough had a little Bossa Nova band playing in it, assuring you bought your books in the most chillest of vibes?

Sweeeeeeeet

Bossa Nova bookstore

That same night was the night of Virada Cultural. This is a night where the entire center of São Paulo is one big buzzing party place with tons of stages hosting tons of acts across all musical genres. I kicked off the night with an amazing Zappa cover band playing aside a university orchestra. During this show most the people I was with had left as Zappa is not the easiest one to listen to. With only Joice and me left we walked about town looking for a certain stage at the other end of it. During this walk I discovered I had actually seen quite a lot with my dad when we were touristing about the center of town. We arrived at the designated stage where the music was mostly house and whatnot. We danced, had fun and after a few hours got called by Rafa to once again head out to Rua Augusta and chill out there. This we did. All in all the night was amazing and the energy fantastic.

The Zappa cover band

Coconutty!

Parteh!

I thought it was candy but it turned out to be flavored cachaça

Late into the night

To balance out the busy party buzz of the night prior, Sunday I headed to the park with my landlords and the dogs for a day of relaxation. The park was supposedly the biggest in the state. Finding out how big it was would have to wait though, as I planted myself on a spot in front of a huge outdoor stage and I didn't move an inch away from it. Soon enough a jazz symphonic orchestra with Nahor on trumpet started playing from the stage and Joice joined us in the park soon after. It was the ultimate recovery day.

Joice and Amélie

The orchestra after the sun had set

That's it, two weeks worth of stuff I did. Generally I tend to keep out the work related things as they are often 'secret' and the bits that are not tend not to be all that interesting to write about.

See you next time. Untill then, peace and love.