Os Mutantes

Never before have I witnessed such pure joy in musical form. Bouncing enthusiastically between all-time favorites and new jams, Os Mutantes celebrated the past without waxing nostalgic, creating a blissfully new performance that was as boisterous as it was inspirational. With a face-wide smile and twinkling eyes, Sergio Dias swam around the stage in a wizard’s gown while Dinho Leme (Mutantes drummer since ’71) shimmied and winked behind the drums, eliciting rhythms ranging from psych-rock to tropicalia to prog-rock to bossa nova and back again. Bia Mendes, a relatively recent addition, provided an excellent foil for Dias. She bopped left and right in her space-witch frock and sang “Baby” straight from the heart with the aid of some incredible eyebrow acrobatics—Ms. Mendes is as expressive with her face as she is with her voice, creating a call and response of jubilant theatricality between herself and Sr. Dias that echoes among the rest of the band members, making it quite clear to me that I have never seen a group of people have more fun. They played for an hour and a half! Hop-scotching through their epic catalog, they brought classics like “El Justiciero”, “Tecnicolor”, and “A Minha Menina” to life like Jesus from the tomb or a phoenix from the ashes—seeing the live performance of songs I’ve been singing along to for years was a mesmerizing, eye-opening, hip-twitching experience.Speaking of birds, Os Mutantes’ new songs are fucking good! Sprinkled throughout the set, cuts from their 2009 release Haih Or Amortecedor—which means ‘raven’ in Shoshone—leap boldly into the future, honoring the past and embracing the best of the present. “2000 e Agarrum” is part circus, part samba, all gloriously bizarre while “Querida Querida” is a Bia-belted rock ballad. “Baghdad Blues” gets political without being self-serious, and “Teclar” mashes Egypt and Brazil, England and America—fuck it, why not Peru and India, too?—into an anthem for driving through unfamiliar countryside or for suddenly making your own countryside appear unfamiliar. Os Mutantes are the masters of odd harmonies and quick changes that tickle as much as they intrigue, of group vocals that soar through major chords then wiggle with dissonance, of ebulliently inventive instrumentation, of elation, of ENERGY! Bill Bartell from White Flag donned a grin almost as impressive as his mustache when he humbly joined his friends onstage for their encore performance of “Bat Macumba,” the ultimate jump-up-and-down-stomp-clap-and-holler Mutantes dance jam that found my arms raised to the heavens, thanking the spirits for that miraculous accident that occurred when Bartell’s family took in a foreign exchange student who would forget the Os Mutantes records that introduced them to America. As the bat macumbas faded away, I held my breath and crossed my fingers and bargained my soul and sure enough…“Panis et Circenses”!!! Hearing the first few notes of my very favorite song elicited my first ever concert scream and left me a bit red in the face and feeling like a pre-teen. I floated mid-air for the next couple minutes and was certain life couldn’t get any better until I found myself being led through a dark hallway into a tiny room where Sergio Dias, Bia Mendes and company kissed me on both cheeks, laughed when I confessed to being the screamer, and sent me off into the world with a smile so big it hurt.