Ok, so the first of a series of interesting (non-baile) Brazilian releases that you can download for your xmas/new year’s entertainment. Here we have “Charque Side of the Moon”, which is Floyd’s proto-ambient classic covered by musicians from the city of Belem in the state of Pará in Amazonia.

The “charque” refered to in the title is a type of beef jerky that is eaten but is also an affectionate name for the female genitalia, hence the charming cover.

The project was put together by Luiz Félix, guitarist and vocalist of the band La Pupuña, who basically had the idea to redo the album but with a strong “paraense” influence and the album has contributions from fifteen members of the paraense music scene. Perhaps most interestingly it has the vocal talents of Gaby Amarantos – a technobrega singer from the band Tecnoshow, on “The great gig in the sky”

“Time” also has some nice heavy percusssion from the carimbó group, Os Baioaras, and “Any colour you like” has merengue percussion, for you music anthropologists out there.

The idea of redoing “Dark Side Of The Moon” is not an original one. The has of course been “Dub side of the moon” by the Easy All Stars, but here it has a distinct Paraense flava, a sound which starting to come into its own now and is worth investigating further.

CHARQUE “MONEY”

Download the whole album here or here is a torrent (courtesy of Som Barato)