Elétrica / Eletrica

Daniela Mercury is so kinetic that she could make the Energizer Bunny seem lazy. What better way to channel that energy than with a live album, one so lively listeners find themselves gasping for breath halfway through and wondering if she'll make it to the end. Her Salvador axé style mixes up reggae and African music with local Bahian beats and with some frenetic percussion as a lively backdrop to her songs. Mercury's quite obviously in her element on-stage, her sensuous voice caressing the songs even as the beat never stops, laying out her stall in the opening title track, where the catchy chorus simply explodes before a hyper guitar solo fires into the stratosphere. This is essentially a refinement of the trios elétricos music Mercury sang at the beginning of her career, meant for entertaining a reveling crowd at Salvador's Carnaval, but with a broader musical canvas. The material is largely drawn from her earlier studio albums, but with all gloss removed in favor of full-tilt renditions that bring everything into another realm. For all that, there's still plenty of subtlety, especially from the horn section, whose contributions push things along sweetly. The biggest surprise, given the massed sound of the drums, is that the band only contains one drummer and three percussionists. This is the real Mercury concert experience, with an adoring audience singing along, and an indication as to why Mercury is such a huge star in her native Brazil.