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Peace in his time
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Jazziz, Peace in his time >>
On Renascence (Times Square), vocalist and acoustic guitarist Waldemar Bastos sings in Portuguese about his native country of Angola, with most of the lyrics alluding to the horrors of -- and hopeful recovery from -- a decades-long civil war that ended in 1991. But what could have been a dark or melodramatic album is instead a delicate and wistful one.
On the opening "Outro Tempo Novo" ("Another New Time"), Bastos' first words are, "The loveliest things in the world pass away over time/so sweet memories turn bitter, they turn bitter." But if you don't know Portuguese and were just listening to Bastos' lilting voice and flamenco-tinged guitar, you wouldn't know anything was amiss. This sounds Like a happy song, and it indeed ends on a happy note: "Let us sing this song then, that will speak to us, speak to us of love, speaks of the two of us."
The same can be said of "Georgina," an upbeat toe-tapper about what it must have been like for soldiers to return home to find their girlfriends have left them or died. What starts traditionally with Bastos' acoustic gui tar and traditional percussion is gradually overtaken by electric guitar and trombone.
Unlike other world-music albums that tout their fusion of many styles and cultures, Bastos does so much more subtly -- except on the last track, an unnecessary reggae remix of "Pitanga Madurinha" ("Pltanga Ready Ripe") by Jamaican toaster Chaka Demus, who overpowers Bastos' original composition heard a few tracks earlier.
Bastos has a worthy story to tell. While in high school, Portuguese secret police jailed him on suspicion of circulating government fliers. He fled to Portugal in 1982 and later, fearing further reprisals, he settled in Brazil, two places that greatly shaped his music. Another influence was former Talking Head David Byrne, who picked up a Bastos album in a record shop in Lisbon and was impressed enough to bring Bastos to New York City and, with Arto Lindsay as producer, Pretaluz (Luaka Bop, 1998). So it's no surprise that Bastos decided to travel for his latest effort. His vocals were recorded in Berlin, the strings in Istanbul, and the rest of the music in Spain. The resulting 11 tracks suggest victory dance for Bastos, especially since he returned to Angola -- to a hero's welcome only -- two years ago. 08/01/05
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