Maria Fumaça cover

Maria Fumaça

Released

As the long arc of MPB took Brazilian popular music from early ’60s samba to late ’60s psychedelia to early ’70s folk and soul, it would inevitably lead to at least one late ’70s reckoning with jazz-funk that would rival anything recorded above the Equator. Banda Black Rio’s Maria Fumaça is just that album, the stunning debut of a seven-member ensemble who were purpose-built to accomplish that very task. And the slinky / slippery / sleek instrumentals on this record so seamlessly embody a simultaneous tradition of Afro-Brazilian and Black American traditions — especially in their blazing horn charts and hipsway-engineered basslines — that it’s hard to tell where the Jorge ends and the Herbie begins. Call it Terra, Vento e Fogo.

Nate Patrin

Suggestions
Herb Alpert Presents Sergio Mendes & Brasil ‘66 cover

Herb Alpert Presents Sergio Mendes & Brasil ‘66

Herb Alpert, Sérgio Mendes & Brasil '66
Maggot Brain cover

Maggot Brain

Funkadelic
Evolution cover

Evolution

Dennis Coffey & The Detroit Guitar Band
Computer Games cover

Computer Games

George Clinton
Rock Your Baby cover

Rock Your Baby

George McCrae
He’s Coming cover

He’s Coming

Roy Ayers Ubiquity
Gentleman cover

Gentleman

Africa 70, Fela Kuti