Agora

Album review

Bebel Gilberto’s raised head on the cover of Agora is nothing trivial. This record has kept her going during a very challenging period in which she has lost her best friend and her mother (the singer Miúcha in December 2018) successively, followed by the death of her father six months later, the legendary singer and guitarist Joao Gilberto. Supported by her producer and close friend, the American Thomas Bartlett, also known as Doveman (Stufjan Stevens, Norah Jones, Anna Calvi …), Bebel has not thrown in the towel and has brought us a less self-evident but more nuanced and mature record than Tanto Tempo (which helped her make a name for herself twenty years ago). Her bossa-nova parental heritage is still underlying here with organic, airy and jazzy electro arrangements dominating, but her singing is less rigid, less carefree and more focused on life. "So good" (Tão Bom) she declaims on her rather ethereal and haunting opening track which precedes the title track, Agora, which is anchored in the present (Agora means “now”). The tracks cleanly move from one to the other and Bebel brings them alive with a sense of freedom thanks to her energetic improvisation. She decorates melodies by using her voice as an instrument, like an agile trumpet in a cool jazz combo. On Na Cara (“in the face”), she comes face to face with the child of another legend, Mart’náliam, the daughter of the great samba musician Martinho de Vila. Next up is Deixa, the album’s volatile first single. But the best is yet to come. O Que Não Foi Dito (“what has not been said”) finds a beautiful balance between gravitas and lightness with its almost martial drums, dreamlike arrangements and moving vocals. The record comes to and end up in the clouds with Teletransportador, where, on top of some slightly retrofuturist offbeat mechanics, Bebel Gilberto's voice produces a languid melody with tenderness and sincerity. © Benjamin MiNiMum/Qobuz