Seu Jorge: Seu Jorge & Almaz

Robin Denselow reviews Seu Jorge's Seu Jorge & Almaz.

Seu Jorge is the wild card of contemporary Brazilian music. He's a soulful samba star and successful actor, best known for his roles in City of God and The Life Aquatic, in which he sang acoustic versions of Bowie songs in Portuguese. Now comes another surprise, with this extraordinary album of even more unlikely cover versions, on which he is backed by the powerful trio of drummer Pupillo and guitarist Lucio Maia from that great band Nação Zumbi, along with bassist Antonio Pinto. The result is an exercise in freewheeling psychedelic samba and funk, with Maia's epic guitar work matched by intimate and relaxed vocals from Jorge.

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