Adobró / Adobro

Together with Diminuto, Adobró is one of the two releases Carlinhos Brown made in 2010 for the Natura Musica project. Whereas Diminuto was beautiful ballad album, and quite unexpected for Brown, Adobró is a collection of funky beats, which Brown presumably recorded to blow off any steam built up after the meticulously crafted Diminuto. Comparisons between both records are unavoidable and, unfortunately, do Adobró very few favors. Most of Adobró consists of extended dance grooves of the Africa-Bahia-on-electronics variation, many with wordless vocalizing instead of lyrics, some more intriguing than others ("Odô Amin" being the best of the crop), but largely unmemorable, and often repetitive. In this context, the appearance — after some 20-plus jam-packed minutes — of the lovely "Tantinho," with its irresistible reggae chorus, feels like a true oasis. The sensation is accentuated by the next two tracks, the album's other more fully realized songs, the ballad "Amor Tomorrow," and "Yarahá," a reggae track with Os Paralamas do Sucesso (who also appeared on Diminuto). For a while it seems as if Adobró dramatically changes gears, only for the two uninspiring closing tracks to make a hasty return to the dance beats that dominate three-quarters of this record.