OS MUTANTES

Better than Os Mutantes psychedelic debut? Maybe. This is the first progressive victory by the band. Must check.

It's a good album. But I'll repeat: It could be better.

Os Mutantes debut. It's like the brazilian "Piper at The Gates of Dawn". It carries some true masterpieces! It carries the wheight of "Panis et Circenses", a PSYCHEDELICMASTERPIECE for real! It's totally out of mainstream, crazy and experimental. I haven't got the mood for this album when I was younger. O Relógio is my favorite track here.

If you are into psychedelic rock, you MUST check this.

That's how I bought Jardim Eletrico, even though the PA ratings weren't impressive and the snippets of the album, available on YouTube weren't too promising. The cover art was great, though. Yes, I am a sucker for good, eye-catching album art :)

I haven't spinned the album much, but the 1st and 2nd listens were starkly disappointing. I wouldn't give it more than 3 stars even in the pop-folk category. Either the "proglivity" of Os Mutantes hadn't kicked in yet, or had already evaporated from their recording studio. I am not hearing much psychedelia or space or progressive stuff; it's just semi-folksy pop, recycling some of the 1960s themes and sounds to the point of looking almost like a parody.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with melodic, well-made non-prog music, but Jardim IMO isn't played or sung too well either. So, my quest for *another* great Brazilian prog album is still underway. Or, I will just stick to Bacamarte, and also to the wonderful non-proggers Elis Regina, Eliane Elias, Azymuth, Eumir Deodato, AC Jobim, Astrud Gilberto, Seu Jorge, Cibelli and the like :)

It is not a hyperbole to call os Mutantes a revolutionary Brazilian band both in the psychedelic and progressive rock fields. They had the guts to do things that were very unpopular back in their days for an artist in this country among its peers, such as importing rock and roll music, using electric instruments, having theatrical performances and changing styles with every new album. Despite all that, they kept going forward up until the late 1970, but their road was not without bumps, being this album one of said bumps.

Recorded quite hastily and right after their official album, Mutantes e seus Cometas no País de Baurets, Hoje é o Primeiro Dia do Resto da Sua Vida was a mean for the band to experiment and record in the newest and most technologically advanced studio in South America and it shows. Due to contractual reasons (their label, Polydor, only allowed them to release one album per year), to test this studio they were forced to release the album under a different moniker and Rita Lee, for whatever reason, was chosen, but make no mistake, this is actually a Mutantes album: all the band members here were from the Mutantes and there is nobody else, all the songs were written by them and it has no significant external collaboration at all.

The album is their most experimental (and I mean experimental in the actual meaning of the word, they were experimenting new studio techniques and equipment, with trial and error, not noodling senseless stuff on an instrument, what seems to be the meaning of experimental on the music circles these days) and, quite frankly, pointless album. At least they were successful in using the brand new studio equipment because this is their best sounding album from their early period. Song-wise, the album isn't very good for the most part and the few good songs are rather forgettable, with the exception of the opening song, Vamos Tratar da Saúde. Allow me to be perfectly clear: this album is mostly to showcase how good their recording studio was, the songs, despite their best efforts, are secondary, what can be shown by audible studio comments during some of the songs. If that was intentional or not is open to debate.

This is also the last album with Rita Lee, what is, in my opinion, something good since they could now focus on songwriting than on their tropicalista and humorous elements, mostly supported by Rita at this point since everybody else was interested in playing and composing great epic songs like their progressive counterparts abroad. Moving away from their original point and with many other artistic and personal differences, Rita left the group, taking this bastard Mutantes album with her in the process.

All in all, this is neither an important nor a good album from the guys hailing from São Paulo. Grab it if you want to have a hard to find piece of historical document, except for that the reasons for having this album aren't plentiful. Two stars.