OS MUTANTES - EVERYTHING IS POSSIBLE!

Os Mutantes was a leading psychedelic Brazilian band that made a couple of progressive albums towards the tail end of its career. This compilation features the classic line-up of Rita Lee Jones and brothers Arnaldo Baptista and Sergio Dias, who were together for the first five albums, which were released in the 1968-1972 period. It focuses mainly on the first three albums Os Mutantes, Mutantes and A Divina Comedia Ou Ando Meio Desligado, with a couple of tracks from Jardim Eletrico and Mutantes E Seus Cometas No Pais Do Baurets thrown in for good measure.

The excellent liner notes (which include Portugese lyrics and their English translations) will prepare you for some Brazillian equivalent of the Beatles, and that will surely lead to a disappointment. But make no mistake about it, Os Mutantes blend of Beatlesque psychedelia, West Coast freak-outs and Brazilian traditional music is worth listening to.

Great tracks include Ando Meio Desligado (even if it's tough to get used to the initial similarity to The Zombies' Time Of The Season!), Ave Lucifer, the heavily phased Dia 36, Fuga No II (which has some fantastic string and brass additions), the crazy percussion-heavy Bat Macumba and the bewildering singalong Panis Et Circenses, which is probably my favourite track of all.

However there were a fair number of songs on here I didn't enjoy. I didn't dig the English bossa nova version of Baby (1971) which has Rita Lee singing instead of Arnaldo who sang the superior Portugese psych version Baby (1968), but fortunately both versions were included. I also thought that Adeus Maria Fulo, Desculpe, Babe and the fuzz-guitar meets mambo workout A Minha Menina were pretty lame. And surely the French language track Le Premier Bonheur Du Jour was a concession to commerciality?

Sometimes Os Mutantes' humour will escape you, for example I first thought of Cantor De Mambo as a shameless Santana copy and then I realised that the song was a deliberate send-up of both Santana and Sergio Mendes. El Justiciero also seems to mock hits like Besame Mucho. There seem to be many levels to Os Mutantes' psychedelic music, and after my initial disappointment, I'm now really getting to enjoy some of them.

Eventually Os Mutantes disintergrated (Rita Lee left for a mainstream pop career, while Arnaldo had a drug-related breakdown) leaving Sergio to take this innovative group into more progressive territory with albums like OAEOZ and Tudo Foi Feto Pelo Sol before finally calling it quits in 1978. Not having heard the more progressive albums, I can't comment on Os Mutantes' attraction during this phase, but I can say that this CD will definitely be of interest to psych fans. ... 51% on the MPV scale

It's my understanding that Os Mutantes has done some truly progressive psychedelic material but that it is not represented in this collection. (Check out the sample here at PA. There is nothing remotely resembling it on this release.) Although some of the songs on this compilation have a thin psychedelic veneer they are Brasilian pop, plain and simple. If you are looking for psychedelic music or tropicalia that has some teeth this will disappoint you. With that being said I did not find the material outstanding in comparison to other Brasilian pop I've heard. I found myself fast-forwarding quite a bit after the first couple of listens and have subsequently consigned the disc to limbo. However Os Mutantes is a bit of sacred cow. If you wish to become literate in Brasilian pop you'll have to check them out sooner or later.