gredin

le gredin

Olivier Cathus

Arty Arto

ARTO LINDSAY, entretien réalisé le 22 mars english version

(la traduction arrive !...)

A LA UNE

SOCIOLOGIE

ACTUS SITOYENNES

RENCONTRES

LITTERATURE

CINEMA

MUSIQUE

POST-FESTUM

Contact :

gredin@free.fr

.
Nous avons rencontré Arto Lindsay, le plus Brésilien des musiciens américains, la veille de son concert à Banlieues Bleues. Très détendu et ne manquant pas d’humour, il nous parle de sa carrière et des artistes brésiliens qu’il apprécie.

Arto Lindsay : One of my best friend in Brazil is Hermano Vianna. He wrote a book about the funk in Rio, where they play a lot of records from America, mostly Miami style. Some of these balls are really violent, some are not, it is very intense though. The kids put words in portuguese that sounds like the words in english. It is an amazing phenomenon.

In France, a few years ago, we had a funk revival, with a lot of bands, etc… and it is amazing to see the difference, because here it was quite peaceful, with a lot of good parties while in Brazil funk is played in more violent areas. Funk in Brazil is maybe like hip-hop in France, it is a bit the same kind of phenomenon…

A.L. : There was an article in The Face about how violent they are but it was so wrong because there is about 15 funk balls every week and only 2 or 3 are really violent, the rest are not so violent. And life is violent, life is very violent in that part of Rio. The poverty is terrible and the gangs control the drugs, etc… Inequality is brutal. Hermano Vianna wrote an other book about samba, who was born at the beginning of the XXth century, the connection between modernism and the formation of samba. It really is a XXth century music, a combination of african music and music that was popular with the bourgeois, french polka, musette, pop music of that time, that is samba…

You are talking about Rio but in what area did you stayed when you were living in Brasil ?

A.L. : I grew up in Pernambuco.

You lived there all the time you stayed in Brasil or did you move to other places ?

A.L. : My parents moved there and took me, in the baggage, when I was 3. And I lived there for 15 years and then I moved back to America. Now, for the last 15 years, I’ve been going there constantly again. I have a place in Rio and I work there. I spend 2, 3 or 4 months there every year. Mostly in Rio and Bahia now.

After your avant-garde career, since you’ve started your singing career, you became more brazilian to people…

A.L. : Yes, that’s well-said because I think I became more brazilian… to people but in my own way of seing it, even in my avant-garde work, the impulse of it came from Brazil. I think about the brazilian pop from the 60’s, a lot of it was quite avant-garde. All over the world too, the Beatles, this was very avant-garde music. The free-jazz influence, the Stockhausen influence, Hendrix just himself and what he did. This is what shaped me as much as what was happening in Brasil, Jorge Ben… There is an history of change, radicality and self-consciousness in brazilian pop music. It was a very deliberate and self-conscious and historically awared movement, " let’s change, let’s be modern ". Jorge Ben himself started with a totally different style. Once they started, they were approached by the concrete poets who said, " do you realize that what you are doing is is very similar to what was done in Brazil in the 20’s ". When I moved to New-York and when I started to make music this felt natural to me. When I just started to play I thought I would become a rock-star immediatly. I wanted to touch people, I did not realized we would be ghettoised to such an extand. I think it has to do with the perception of punk as a social movement. It was anti-everything, nihilistic. It was a reaction to the situation in England. Punk thing in New-York is, in a way, more aesthetic than social, you know what I mean. So even in DNA, I had lyrics in portuguese, Fernando Pessoa cut-ups, we were really interested in trance and possession. It was in 77-78. We were interested in music from all different countries and trying to have it in the avant-garde thing. At the beginning, people didn’t really perceive this.
You are mixing brazilian influences in your music, Beck says he likes Caetano Veloso and they will record together, New-York is an exception maybe becaue it is very cosmopolitan, but it really seems that the american culture is not very opened to other cultures.
I know what you are talking about. America is huge. America makes… if you think about the pop music of the world, basically you have United States and… Brazil… and there’s not so much place left (rires). It is already so much, it is this stuff, this african-european stuff everybody likes. Because it helps you get laid and it helps you think, what else do you want ? But America is an isolated place, or has been. America dominates or has dominated and continues to dominate the world, they don’t need anything else. America also is a country where it is far away. It’s not like Europe where you have all these little countries all together. America is a place economically self-sufficient, there is imperialism here and there but it doesn’t have a long history. And I consider Brazil and United States very similar. Yes, most Americans don’t speak an other language, everything else is far away and exotic and a little scary. New-York is different. But it is changing. It has to do with so many different things : fear of economic decline even though the United States is really dominating now, it has to do with globalization sort of generation thing, it has to do with cd’s opposed to records, distribution getting better. I’m sure there is historical factors that are also pushing America to open up. But when you are talking about Beck and people like that, you are talking about the cool intelligent young kids who are looking for something new and interesting. It’s got to go beyond them to really made a huge difference, to really spread out. The same generation that Beck is part of is also really interested in electro-acoustic music. You know all the XXth century experimental electronic music. In the 80’s when I was trying to make a living mixing indirectly with samba, Al Green, etc…, everybody hated it. And people really ressented the ambition of art, now in the 90’s the kids, the same groups of kids, the smart kids, are interested in all this. This has to do with the dj culture, the popularization of the idea of post-modernism, that whole feeling that nobody knows what to do next. Well, that’s go backwards, look backwards and choose to put all sorts of things together. It has to do with the internet, the feeling that you can connect to the whole world. It is curious to see how this will translate to the american culture at large, to the whole thing, that hasn’t happened yet. Yes, the cool kids are cool but what about everyboy else ? Because what is happening now in America with the Cristina Aguillerra, Ricky Martin, Backstreet Boys, even the rock bands like Korn, it’s the same idea they’ve had for ten years, like hip-hop, or heavy-metal thing, that’s not new. I’m curious to see what will happen to that big thing.

I guess you are curious too of the new brazilian scene. In a way, you could be considered as an avant-gardist for this new scene mixing electronics with local rhythms, and when you listen to a guy like Otto you might wonder if you were maybe an influence ?

A.L. : Yes, we did a lot of shit 15 years ago that people are doing now. And we did it better 15 years ago than these fucking kids (rires) ! Obviously yes. But I’m interested in making something with this stuff. It is not enough to say we take this and that. We have to make something. That’s why Chico Science was really the guy. Brown is one of my best friends. I think what he does is unbelievable and great. But if you just judge it purely artistically, you have to say that Chico Science did something, he did the most amazing thing. Because his work was completely synthetic. He took heavy-metal and funk guitars, electric guitars, he took all these local things like maracatu and stuff. And he took hip-hop. He connected hip-hop to that old brazilian tradition of repente, which is also rhiming, improvizing. And he made something that is not any of those things. He made just music. And so much that’s happening now, if you take indian singers, you put a hip-hop beat or a techno beat and you take the XXth century sounding string section and you make this thing but it is not… a thing. It is too most-modern, it is too obvious the connections. It’s not separate enough and it’s not together enough. It’s not separate enough so that you have to make a mental jump, it’s not fragmented enough, it’s not "Benjamin" enough, you know when you read him and it’s just woh-woohh. It’s not like that. But it’s also not like Chico.

Last year, I interviewed Brown and the word that was always coming back in his conversation was " organic ", do you think that this idea of organic is necessary for these fusion things and musics to stay "together" ?

A.L. : That’s true, that’s a good point. Brown is brilliant. I think that certainly true of his live shows and of his larger project, his whole project. Because it is so social. It’s connected to a messianic tradition of the north-east of Brazil, the Canudos etc… Total poverty, very or almost feodal system, very mystical approach to catharsism, and these figures that lead the people. Brown’s all thing comes up from there. In Bahia, you see, he built this huge place for live-shows, the Guetto Square, he built this incredible studio, he has Timbalada, he has Os Zarabes, he has Lactomania, he has his own band. During the Carnival, he supports all the groups. He is everywhere, it is unbelievable, you think there is 5 Browns because he is everywhere. So his thing surfes on this huge project to translate it into a record. He is still finding the right rhythm, the right way of working. I hope he makes a really organic next record. I hope he is making this damn record in his own studio and he just records a lot, very organic stuff, and then takes it to New-York. Because the last record is very beautiful but that’s an other ambition, an other kind of musical proceedure, a little Tom Jobim, a little bit of this and that…

What were the special ambitions and directions of your last album Prize ?

A.L. : It is just to make an other record, you know…

There is a kind of continuity from an album to an other…

A.L. : Yeah, it’s a difficult position my position because people expect something new every time. And at the same time, for my own organic reasons, I just want to continue. There is a tension between these things. I want to get better as a singer, I want to get better as a song-writer. In the last records, maybe some of those conflicts came to the surface, for me. For us, because I made it with Mevin Gibbs, Andres Levin. It’s not really a band but I wanted it as much of a band it can be and not being a band. It’s my record, it’s my name, it’s my work but I like bands. It’s very difficult because Andres and Melvin are really busy.

Vinicius Cantuaria also is part of the band…

A.L. : Yeah. On " Prize " he wasn’t there so much but on the other records he was.

When I first heard you singing, I found an obvious influence of Caetano but, also, when I listened to his album " Livro " I found his " sound " was a little flat, compared to those of his albums you produced. Anyway, is he your main brazilian influence ?

A.L. : Well, he definitly is a huge influence and I work hard to return the favor. Push it a little bit too. We are really good friends. You know, it’s easy for me to admit the influence because I came afterwards. It’s not easy for him to even think about the influence because his project is historical in brazilian music, and in the place of brazilian music in the world. He thinks about himself in very large terms, justifiedly. In some ways, I think people over-estimate my influence on him. You’ve got to remember how long he has been doing this and how avant-garde his work was and at different times. But sonically, yeah there’s definitly something going on.

It’s true that in his all-time career, he has’nt made any bad albums, exept maybe two in the 80’s like " Velo " that sounds bad…

A.L. : Yes, amazing songs but some of the worst productions… But event that was really interesting because that was so conscious on his part. Because Gil works with Liminha, a really strong producer, and Gil tries to make international pop records.

With all that Earth, Wind & Fire stuff…

A.L. : Yes, Earth, Wind & Fire or Police, it’s amazing how dominant those sounds were. When you look back, it’s like the Police are responsible for an amazing amount of really bad music, you know (rires). And Caetano was really specifically separating himself from that. And sayind "I will produce my own pop records". For what ever reasons these albums sound terrible today as a record, but if you look at the compositions there is some songs on this album that are amongst his best songs ever, "Os quereres". "Voce è linda" is a beautiful song but many people could have written that. But a song like " os quereres " is unically Ceatano. It’s so philosophical and so musical and so connected to brazilian music and avant-garde proceedures. Nobody else could have written that song.

What your show will be like tomorrow ?

A.L. : We play the same show wether it is a jazz festival or a club. I mean we react to the audience a lot. It is not necessarly clear thing. It’s not so simple : playing more ballads, etc… It’s a live show, a playing show. Sometimes, it’ s closer to the record, same arrangements, sometimes it’s a version, very loose version. But the guys want to play, I’m interested in musicians and what they add to my music. It challenges me on stage, I’m not interested in a back-up group, I’m interested in the music. You know, I think I have one of the best bands in this fucking world. Tell-me who is better ? Show me a band like that ? No rock-star has a band like that, there’s a bunch of guys they pay. Caetano doesn’t do that kind of show. Caetano has a theatrical experience that’s always the same. Caetano as a singer is unequalled. He is there with Al Green, Curtis Mayfield (may he rests in peace), João Gilberto, people I consider the best singers. But the show is more like a theatrical experience.

Does sometimes the audience want to dance ?

A.L. : It depends on the kind of place. We play all kind of places. It depends if the people are standing or seating. And the show dancing moments and listening moments.

Propos reccueillis par Olivier Cathus

le gredin		Olivier Cathus Arty Arto *ARTO LINDSAY, entretien réalisé le 22 mars english version* *(la traduction arrive !...)*

A LA UNE SOCIOLOGIE ACTUS SITOYENNES RENCONTRES LITTERATURE CINEMA MUSIQUE POST-FESTUM Contact : gredin@free.fr		. Nous avons rencontré Arto Lindsay, le plus Brésilien des musiciens américains, la veille de son concert à Banlieues Bleues. Très détendu et ne manquant pas d’humour, il nous parle de sa carrière et des artistes brésiliens qu’il apprécie. Arto Lindsay : One of my best friend in Brazil is Hermano Vianna. He wrote a book about the funk in Rio, where they play a lot of records from America, mostly Miami style. Some of these balls are really violent, some are not, it is very intense though. The kids put words in portuguese that sounds like the words in english. It is an amazing phenomenon. In France, a few years ago, we had a funk revival, with a lot of bands, etc… and it is amazing to see the difference, because here it was quite peaceful, with a lot of good parties while in Brazil funk is played in more violent areas. Funk in Brazil is maybe like hip-hop in France, it is a bit the same kind of phenomenon… A.L. : There was an article in The Face about how violent they are but it was so wrong because there is about 15 funk balls every week and only 2 or 3 are really violent, the rest are not so violent. And life is violent, life is very violent in that part of Rio. The poverty is terrible and the gangs control the drugs, etc… Inequality is brutal. Hermano Vianna wrote an other book about samba, who was born at the beginning of the XXth century, the connection between modernism and the formation of samba. It really is a XXth century music, a combination of african music and music that was popular with the bourgeois, french polka, musette, pop music of that time, that is samba… You are talking about Rio but in what area did you stayed when you were living in Brasil ? A.L. : I grew up in Pernambuco. You lived there all the time you stayed in Brasil or did you move to other places ? A.L. : My parents moved there and took me, in the baggage, when I was 3. And I lived there for 15 years and then I moved back to America. Now, for the last 15 years, I’ve been going there constantly again. I have a place in Rio and I work there. I spend 2, 3 or 4 months there every year. Mostly in Rio and Bahia now. After your avant-garde career, since you’ve started your singing career, you became more brazilian to people… A.L. : Yes, that’s well-said because I think I became more brazilian… to people but in my own way of seing it, even in my avant-garde work, the impulse of it came from Brazil. I think about the brazilian pop from the 60’s, a lot of it was quite avant-garde. All over the world too, the Beatles, this was very avant-garde music. The free-jazz influence, the Stockhausen influence, Hendrix just himself and what he did. This is what shaped me as much as what was happening in Brasil, Jorge Ben… There is an history of change, radicality and self-consciousness in brazilian pop music. It was a very deliberate and self-conscious and historically awared movement, " let’s change, let’s be modern ". Jorge Ben himself started with a totally different style. Once they started, they were approached by the concrete poets who said, " do you realize that what you are doing is is very similar to what was done in Brazil in the 20’s ". When I moved to New-York and when I started to make music this felt natural to me. When I just started to play I thought I would become a rock-star immediatly. I wanted to touch people, I did not realized we would be ghettoised to such an extand. I think it has to do with the perception of punk as a social movement. It was anti-everything, nihilistic. It was a reaction to the situation in England. Punk thing in New-York is, in a way, more aesthetic than social, you know what I mean. So even in DNA, I had lyrics in portuguese, Fernando Pessoa cut-ups, we were really interested in trance and possession. It was in 77-78. We were interested in music from all different countries and trying to have it in the avant-garde thing. At the beginning, people didn’t really perceive this. You are mixing brazilian influences in your music, Beck says he likes Caetano Veloso and they will record together, New-York is an exception maybe becaue it is very cosmopolitan, but it really seems that the american culture is not very opened to other cultures. I know what you are talking about. America is huge. America makes… if you think about the pop music of the world, basically you have United States and… Brazil… and there’s not so much place left (rires). It is already so much, it is this stuff, this african-european stuff everybody likes. Because it helps you get laid and it helps you think, what else do you want ? But America is an isolated place, or has been. America dominates or has dominated and continues to dominate the world, they don’t need anything else. America also is a country where it is far away. It’s not like Europe where you have all these little countries all together. America is a place economically self-sufficient, there is imperialism here and there but it doesn’t have a long history. And I consider Brazil and United States very similar. Yes, most Americans don’t speak an other language, everything else is far away and exotic and a little scary. New-York is different. But it is changing. It has to do with so many different things : fear of economic decline even though the United States is really dominating now, it has to do with globalization sort of generation thing, it has to do with cd’s opposed to records, distribution getting better. I’m sure there is historical factors that are also pushing America to open up. But when you are talking about Beck and people like that, you are talking about the cool intelligent young kids who are looking for something new and interesting. It’s got to go beyond them to really made a huge difference, to really spread out. The same generation that Beck is part of is also really interested in electro-acoustic music. You know all the XXth century experimental electronic music. In the 80’s when I was trying to make a living mixing indirectly with samba, Al Green, etc…, everybody hated it. And people really ressented the ambition of art, now in the 90’s the kids, the same groups of kids, the smart kids, are interested in all this. This has to do with the dj culture, the popularization of the idea of post-modernism, that whole feeling that nobody knows what to do next. Well, that’s go backwards, look backwards and choose to put all sorts of things together. It has to do with the internet, the feeling that you can connect to the whole world. It is curious to see how this will translate to the american culture at large, to the whole thing, that hasn’t happened yet. Yes, the cool kids are cool but what about everyboy else ? Because what is happening now in America with the Cristina Aguillerra, Ricky Martin, Backstreet Boys, even the rock bands like Korn, it’s the same idea they’ve had for ten years, like hip-hop, or heavy-metal thing, that’s not new. I’m curious to see what will happen to that big thing. I guess you are curious too of the new brazilian scene. In a way, you could be considered as an avant-gardist for this new scene mixing electronics with local rhythms, and when you listen to a guy like Otto you might wonder if you were maybe an influence ? A.L. : Yes, we did a lot of shit 15 years ago that people are doing now. And we did it better 15 years ago than these fucking kids (rires) ! Obviously yes. But I’m interested in making something with this stuff. It is not enough to say we take this and that. We have to make something. That’s why Chico Science was really the guy. Brown is one of my best friends. I think what he does is unbelievable and great. But if you just judge it purely artistically, you have to say that Chico Science did something, he did the most amazing thing. Because his work was completely synthetic. He took heavy-metal and funk guitars, electric guitars, he took all these local things like maracatu and stuff. And he took hip-hop. He connected hip-hop to that old brazilian tradition of repente, which is also rhiming, improvizing. And he made something that is not any of those things. He made just music. And so much that’s happening now, if you take indian singers, you put a hip-hop beat or a techno beat and you take the XXth century sounding string section and you make this thing but it is not… a thing. It is too most-modern, it is too obvious the connections. It’s not separate enough and it’s not together enough. It’s not separate enough so that you have to make a mental jump, it’s not fragmented enough, it’s not "Benjamin" enough, you know when you read him and it’s just woh-woohh. It’s not like that. But it’s also not like Chico. Last year, I interviewed Brown and the word that was always coming back in his conversation was " organic ", do you think that this idea of organic is necessary for these fusion things and musics to stay "together" ? A.L. : That’s true, that’s a good point. Brown is brilliant. I think that certainly true of his live shows and of his larger project, his whole project. Because it is so social. It’s connected to a messianic tradition of the north-east of Brazil, the Canudos etc… Total poverty, very or almost feodal system, very mystical approach to catharsism, and these figures that lead the people. Brown’s all thing comes up from there. In Bahia, you see, he built this huge place for live-shows, the Guetto Square, he built this incredible studio, he has Timbalada, he has Os Zarabes, he has Lactomania, he has his own band. During the Carnival, he supports all the groups. He is everywhere, it is unbelievable, you think there is 5 Browns because he is everywhere. So his thing surfes on this huge project to translate it into a record. He is still finding the right rhythm, the right way of working. I hope he makes a really organic next record. I hope he is making this damn record in his own studio and he just records a lot, very organic stuff, and then takes it to New-York. Because the last record is very beautiful but that’s an other ambition, an other kind of musical proceedure, a little Tom Jobim, a little bit of this and that… What were the special ambitions and directions of your last album Prize ? A.L. : It is just to make an other record, you know… There is a kind of continuity from an album to an other… A.L. : Yeah, it’s a difficult position my position because people expect something new every time. And at the same time, for my own organic reasons, I just want to continue. There is a tension between these things. I want to get better as a singer, I want to get better as a song-writer. In the last records, maybe some of those conflicts came to the surface, for me. For us, because I made it with Mevin Gibbs, Andres Levin. It’s not really a band but I wanted it as much of a band it can be and not being a band. It’s my record, it’s my name, it’s my work but I like bands. It’s very difficult because Andres and Melvin are really busy. Vinicius Cantuaria also is part of the band… A.L. : Yeah. On " Prize " he wasn’t there so much but on the other records he was. When I first heard you singing, I found an obvious influence of Caetano but, also, when I listened to his album " Livro " I found his " sound " was a little flat, compared to those of his albums you produced. Anyway, is he your main brazilian influence ? A.L. : Well, he definitly is a huge influence and I work hard to return the favor. Push it a little bit too. We are really good friends. You know, it’s easy for me to admit the influence because I came afterwards. It’s not easy for him to even think about the influence because his project is historical in brazilian music, and in the place of brazilian music in the world. He thinks about himself in very large terms, justifiedly. In some ways, I think people over-estimate my influence on him. You’ve got to remember how long he has been doing this and how avant-garde his work was and at different times. But sonically, yeah there’s definitly something going on. It’s true that in his all-time career, he has’nt made any bad albums, exept maybe two in the 80’s like " Velo " that sounds bad… A.L. : Yes, amazing songs but some of the worst productions… But event that was really interesting because that was so conscious on his part. Because Gil works with Liminha, a really strong producer, and Gil tries to make international pop records. With all that Earth, Wind & Fire stuff… A.L. : Yes, Earth, Wind & Fire or Police, it’s amazing how dominant those sounds were. When you look back, it’s like the Police are responsible for an amazing amount of really bad music, you know (rires). And Caetano was really specifically separating himself from that. And sayind "I will produce my own pop records". For what ever reasons these albums sound terrible today as a record, but if you look at the compositions there is some songs on this album that are amongst his best songs ever, "Os quereres". "Voce è linda" is a beautiful song but many people could have written that. But a song like " os quereres " is unically Ceatano. It’s so philosophical and so musical and so connected to brazilian music and avant-garde proceedures. Nobody else could have written that song. What your show will be like tomorrow ? A.L. : We play the same show wether it is a jazz festival or a club. I mean we react to the audience a lot. It is not necessarly clear thing. It’s not so simple : playing more ballads, etc… It’s a live show, a playing show. Sometimes, it’ s closer to the record, same arrangements, sometimes it’s a version, very loose version. But the guys want to play, I’m interested in musicians and what they add to my music. It challenges me on stage, I’m not interested in a back-up group, I’m interested in the music. You know, I think I have one of the best bands in this fucking world. Tell-me who is better ? Show me a band like that ? No rock-star has a band like that, there’s a bunch of guys they pay. Caetano doesn’t do that kind of show. Caetano has a theatrical experience that’s always the same. Caetano as a singer is unequalled. He is there with Al Green, Curtis Mayfield (may he rests in peace), João Gilberto, people I consider the best singers. But the show is more like a theatrical experience. Does sometimes the audience want to dance ? A.L. : It depends on the kind of place. We play all kind of places. It depends if the people are standing or seating. And the show dancing moments and listening moments.
		Propos reccueillis par Olivier Cathus