A ARTE E A MÚSICA DE BANDA DO CASACO

Banda Do Casaco is a Portuguese progressive folk band active from 1974 to 1984 considered by many, critics and public, as one of the Portuguese greatest progressive rock bands ever. Born of the encounter of elements from jazz, as Nuno Rodrigues, and from a band difficult to classify named Filarmónica Fraude of António Pinho, Banda Do Casaco lived essentially much of the leadership of these two elements and of their ability to surround themselves always by excellent voices and instrumentalists. One of the main features of the band was the frequent change of their line up, keeping Pinho, Rodrigues and the cellist Celso de Carvalho, and latter, António Pinheiro da Silva as their band's base.

It was in 1973 that it was given the first encounter between Pinho and Rodrigues, who immediately started writing for their debut studio album, "Dos Benefícios De Um Vendido No Reino Dos Bonifácios", just only released in 1975. The singular album's name began already to denote a certain surrealistic tone and a certain irreverence that will accompany all the musical work of the band. That surrealistic tone emerges sharp on the cover of the LP, from designs by Carlos Zingaro, made with a kind of comics that reproduces some of the moments of the narrative presented on that album.

In the following year, 1976, born their second studio work, "Coisas Do Arco Da Velha". The satirical talent of writing puns by Pinho combines perfectly well with some musical innovative solutions. On the album emerge the guitar work of Armindo Neves and the violin of Mena Amaro, who replaced Carlos Zingaro. Songs like "Morgadinha Dos Canibais", "Canto De Amor E Trabalho", "É Triste Não Saber Ler", "A Mulher Do Regedor" or "Cantiga D'Embalar Avozinhas" contributed to an unexpected success with critics and public, being to be considered in Portugal the album of the year.

And it's because of these two first studio albums of Banda Do Casaco that appears this compilation, which was released in 1988. So, "A Arte E A Música De Banda Do Casaco" is a compilation album that includes these two albums.

As I've already reviewed these two albums previously on Progarchives, in a more extensive way, I'm not going to do it again. So, if you are interested to know, in more detail, what I wrote about them before, I invite you to read those my both reviews. However, in here, I'm going to write something about them in a more short way. So, of course, I'm not going to analyze them track by track, as I made before, but I'm only going to make a global appreciation of both albums.

"Dos Benefícios De Um Vendido No Reino Dos Bonifácios": "Dos Benefícios De Um Vendido No Reino Dos Bonifácios" is a conceptual album. Lyrically, the story develops around of a character who sells his soul to the Devil in return, not so much for knowledge or wisdom, but only for money and social prestige. This entire narrative is served to the listener through excellent satiric lyrics, always cared, poetic, corrosive, allegorical and metaphorical. Musically, the group will drink their musical influences from several different musical sources. The two most important are the intervention songs and the traditional Portuguese music. The final result is an exceptional album from the lyrical, musical and even from the art cover point of view. It's an entirely acoustic album with lots of instruments performed, which some of them are very unusual, plenty of vocal works and an irreverent musical approach to the composition mixed with very special lyrics of the conceptual story. The final result is and incredible and very original album, a must have for all prog lovers.

"Coisas Do Arco Da Velha": After their previous very strong debut studio album "Dos Benefícios Dum Vendido No Reino Dos Bonifácios", "Coisas Do Arco Da Velha" is a more conventional musical work in order to sell better than their previous album, which wasn't very well received in those days. Musically, it's a more conservative effort, really. In reality, it lacks to it the experimentalism that can be seen on their debut. However, we can see on it some glimpses of brilliance too. The singing, playing, composition and songwriting are among the best of the band and are also among the best ever hearing in Portugal. Anyway, as said António Pinho in an interview some time ago, Banda Do Casaco never was a group with a continuity in their work and each album has a very own sound. So, the final result was a more musical conventional work nearest of the typical Portuguese folk. It's also an excellent album, even today, but it's definitely less interesting than their previous studio work, and while having its merits, turns out in comparison with "Dos Benefícios Dum Vendido No Reino Dos Bonifácios". Still, it remains, for me, a great and a very impressive work.

Conclusion: "A Arte E A Música De Banda Do Casaco" is an excellent compilation album with two of the best albums from the group. As many of us know, Portugal never was a hot bed in terms of progressive music. We mustn't forget that Portugal lived under a dictatorial political regime with censure from 28 Mai 1926 to 25 April 1974. In those times, Portugal was almost closed to the world and so it was very difficult to make any kind of art out of the tight canons of that regime. After 25 of April, Portugal lived another troubled political period with the communists trying to control the country. So, in terms of music it was fashionable to make protest songs with direct political lyrics. However, Banda Do Casaco never followed that route. They were much more intelligent making lyrics more subtle and more creative music.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)