3 ½ stars out of 4

The story goes that the northeastern Brazilian band Cabruêra has its origins in a visit to a backwoods Indian oracle, who named the band after a herd of goats and commissioned it to resist and redeem through music the rootless concrete gloom of the modern slum. The group's five members, it turns out, would not restore roots merely by relying on established musical tradition, but they would devour everything they heard and then follow their instincts. Cabruêra creates something fresh for those who might think they've heard it all in popular Brazilian music. On "Proibido Cochilar," the hot accordion-dance forró of the band's hard-bitten region is one of several recognizable native styles lending structure to these sambas, but there's also a good deal of funk-rock, club, hip-hop urbanism and even jazz animating them. The brilliant bass-fueled rhythms and culture clash, played cool as on the cover song "Carcará," or played full-force as on "Zabé Sabe," "Xingatório" or "Eu Sambo" are nothing short of amazing