Spin Bonde do Rolê’s With Lasers and explosions tremor through hips. On sweat-drenched floors, on concrete walks that could boil an egg, we slip, we grip shoulders to stay afloat, we move, brutally and joyfully like we’ve got nothing and everything to lose.
Vaguely nostalgic samples of hair metal and ’80s cheeserock are ripped apart and safety-pinned back together by DJ Rodrigo Gorky, then layered over fat, greasy chunks of macho beats and punctuated with guerilla kazoos and tongue-twisted Portuguese taunts by MCs Pedro D'Eyrot and Marina Vello that I’ve been assured are about nothing but sex. And lewd, anal-licking sex at that. Tasty.
Bonde do Rolê’s neon-blazing baile funk could easily be the catchiest, dirtiest, most mindless music of the summer. Incomprehensible lyrics and fast, familiar rhythms prolong the life of any sunrise party. But With Lazers is deceptively convoluted music, plucked from the shanties of southern Brazil and produced by Philly’s incomparable Diplo, the man responsible for M.I.A. and CSS’s spasmodic sounds. Bonde do Rolê is just as boundary-smashing as Diplo’s better-known acts.
On With Lasers, Bonde do Rolê shakes a volatile, carbonated cocktail, traipsing between oceans and musical genres, between youthful dissent and incisive carelessness.
Since hooking up with Diplo, the trio’s been dropped into American clubs opening for the likes of the Klaxons and CSS, into some Nokia commercial, and even into a Jessica Alba promo on GQ.com that’s all lingering crotch and boob shots. At first, watching this promo vid (linked through Wikipedia.org) seems strange — a juxtaposition between guileless commercial cock tease and ironically smutty, thrashing underground funk. But that’s just what Bonde do Rolê is. A bizarre coagulation of deliberate guilelessness and covert dexterity. Commercial sounding, though entirely dodgy in its use of well-known, costly samples. Slutty and smutty — a bawdy tomboy who’ll spit in your face then stick her tongue down your throat in the next breath.
Despite the stealthy postmodern fluidities of With Lasers, it’s easy to just have fun to this album. With Lasers is, both superficially and genuinely, a delightful album that’ll get at least 75% of your party posse laid — or at least lip-bruised on the dancefloor.
Copyrights
Caralyn Green. Bonde do Rolê. Copyright 2007 Venus Zine.
