Papangu - Garage Grindhouse, Rio de Janeiro 7 June 2025

Papangu are the most interesting Brazilian discovery for me of this decade. Their music is not for everyone, but if you like your prog rock filled with Brazilian North Eastern influences as well as Black metal, jazz and stoner you might appreciate this band as much as I do. Their debut Holoceno from 2021 made it to my end of year list as did their follow up Lampião Rei from 2024 This year great news came when a European tour was announced including two shows in The Netherlands. I have a ticket for the Little Devil show 22 August and am still in doubt on Complexity Festival the next day. So when I thought to finally get to see the band in August, a mini tour in Brazil was announced with a show in Rio on 7 June. Now that sounded great, but already made commitments sent me to Cachoeiras de Macacu on 7 June. That was until last minute changes due to a sad story which ended well, put that compromise two weeks back. Long story short, I was going to see Papangu in their home country after all and looking more than a bit forward to this show.

Gargae Grindhouse was the venue and I never had been there before. So one night after more mainstream Sacadura 154 having Kio Loureiro, I now got to dive deeper in the underground and go to Rua Ceara for some north eastern music, which seemed appropiate. Upon arrival I bumped into two members of the band, who told me that today they played as a four-piece, but in Europe they shall be a 5 men band.I in return could tell them that I offered my HM B&B for the band, but logistics made it impossible, as you can't drive from The Hague to Berlin on a summer Sunday, when you need to arrive at a certain time in Berlin. After these talks I entered Garage Grindhouse and loved being in a proper underground venue. Black walls with graffitti of stars who left us, or are still among us. A  bar selling ice cold half liter cans of beer for 8 Reais (which is Euro 1.25 more or less)  a merch table, where I fast picked up my GGG Lampião Rei T-shirt and a good vibe arond in a place that filled up very nicely in time. This was a matinee show between 17:00-21:00 and somewhere close to seven the band kicked off. 

Papangu sing in Portuguese, which I do understand, but do not sing along all that easy. So I recognized most of the songs coming off their two albums, but could not immediately sing along. What I did see from the beginning is that I would love this show. I don't know how far the band improvises through their show, but it all sounded and looked enormous spontaneous. Meanwhile the mix of Brazilian music with sudden black metal outbursts was impressive and great at the same time. I believe that both albums were played for the bigger part and several new songs were tried out. This after the friendly request not to film these new songs and post them. That was when I realized that I hardly saw phones filming this show, unlike the night before. Everyone was enjoying the moment, like it is supposed to be.When more towards the end the crowd and I started cheering Hu-Hu-Papangu I wondered what their shows in Europe would be like. Even more so, when the crowd sang along with parts off a chorus. No worries though as the band seems to be creative on stage and how often do you see plastic pigs and chickens opnening a song by being squeezed? 

So I loved the show that ended 20:55 as promised and am aleady looking forward to seeing them in Little Devil. I have no idea how known they are in Europe, but my guess would be hardly. So I will tag some of my more open minded metal FB friends somewher in August. Those going for the more straight forward metal, might find Papangu um ponte (a bridge, but they sing in Portuguese remember) too far. I shall be there and for sure enjoy myself lots. Until then I shall proudly wear my Papangu shirt at the Beach and in the city of The Hague. If you have never heard of the band, but like to hear something completely different and original, try them out now and I might see you in Little Devil or Patronaat. What considers Garage Grindhouse I found a favourite venue in Rio. When leaving I saw that four house further there is a Motorclub, which had a rockband playing on the street. Defnitely a place to return too.

Kiko Loureiro with Marty Friedman & Andy Addams - Sacadura 154 Rio de Janeiro, 6 June 2025

This show had a long start-up. In November I arrived in Brazil one day before Manowar were supposed to play in Rio. As I had not seen Manowar live  for a long time I bought myself a ticket. This to learn on the day that Manowar had cancelled the show. I was in contact with promoters of the show and they promised to send my money back through paypall. Now I realized they lost a large amount and I already knew that Marty Friedman would come to Rio when I was back in town in June. So I told them to keep the money and swap my ticket for one of the Marty Friedman show. This was possible, but I received the tickets through whatsapp only the week before the show. Tickets? yes, as Valerio was so nice to send me two tickets as the Manowar show was much more expensive than the Kiko Loureiro show. So I could invite a friend. Bruno was more than pleased to join me, so we agreed to meet inside Sacadura 154. This venue is located in the centre , where many offices are and nights can be grim. Not so much in the street of the venue, where lots of live music could be heard, all displaying samba or pagode, which is not really my thing. Still the atmosphere on the street was good.

Now I said that Marty Friedman would play, but it turned out he was a guest on this tour. The show itself was by Kiko Loureiro a Brazilian most known from his years with Angra and Megadeth. The venue said doors 20:00 and show 22:00. Now  I learned the hard way once that in Brazil show 22:00 means the headlier starts at that time. I did read about a support somewhere (not at the venue's page) so I decided to aim at 20:30 as I like to check out support bands. Being a bit later I missed the first song by Andy Addams. I never heard of Andy before. In spite of his english name he grew up in Colombia and spoke Portuguese to us. More important his music was rather fine. A guitar shredder of sorts with lights over his clothes and a bass and drum supporting him during lots of instrumentals where even a medley of famous songs was treated on instrumental versions. This was a nice opener fitting well with the headliners. 

In spite of Josie's warning not to take the time scheule too serious in Brazil (see Friburgo Rock Festival) it was at 22:00 that lights went off and Kiko Loureiro came on. He started with three instrumentals and that sounded very good. Megadeth was next and he also sung on a recently written song. I thought his voice OK, but not at Gary Moore's level yet. I mention Gary Moore as some of the instrumental guitar singing was not miles away from that. Introducing the band I only understood later that Bruno on drums and Felipe on bass play in the current Angra band. Now I like me some Angra, but I am hardly their biggest fan. So when we got a medley of Angra songs I did not recognize them all, but the instrumental versions came over well in medley format. I must say that the Megadeth hereafetr sounded better to me with Conquer or Die and Dystopia. Kiko took care of vocals and with originals by Dave Mustaine he managed well. Further down the show we got a vocalist on stage Alirio Netto. Again unknown to me, but he had a good voice for covering soe more Angra work. This ended with an acoustic  two man set-up which brought the song where Milton Nascimento sings on CD and the opening of Heaven and Hell. The audience showed they were carioca meanwhile by starting to sing to Kiko(rara) some Calcinha Preta. Jokes Bruno needed to explain to me afterwards. 

Taking the barstools of the stage the moment came where I was waiting for most Marty Friedman would join in. And as good as Kiko might have been (and that as very good) it was Marty that managed to lift the show to even higher levels. He was allowed to take the main part for a while and Tornado of Souls did pass instrumental. He than tried to be as Brazilian as he could by playing Asa Branca / Brasileirinho. Songs that all in Brazil know, but it sounded very Marty Friedman to me. Hereafter we got a song of Drama his latest album. Tearful Confession was beautiful and I did something out of character. The whole evening I saw lots of cameras filming before me. During this song not so many, so I picked my phone and filmed a part of the calm opening and a part of the metalling up of the song.Than it was back to Angra with a guitar ruled version of Rebirth after which the band left the stage. The shouts for mais um from the audience were heard and the band came back with Alirio on vocals to play Stormbringer Unfortunately no more Marty and hereafer the party was over. One great evening for those into shredding guitars, with lots of melody and emotion blended in to keep things interesting. Marty Friedman showing again why he is one of my absolute favourite guitarists and Kiko turned out to be pretty fine too.