All those who succumb one day to Brazilian music end up putting their finger on the little extra soul that made them capsize: saudade. A Portuguese word, untranslatable into French, which refers to this strange melancholy, sweet, sometimes even joyful, always contagious.
Under the name of Niteroy, in a nod to Niterói, a city next to Rio de Janeiro, the young Rennes-based Tiago Ribeiro seeks to create his own saudade by infusing the groove so particular to old sambas into pop compositions with refined and classy arrangements. The result is songs that sound as if they have always been known, obvious, immediate and contagious. You might think of Marcos Valle and Tim Maia inviting Anderson Paak, Devendra Banhart and Bertrand Burgalat to chat on the beach after giving them a tour of the city. Everyone whistling an ancestral refrain heard higher up in the hills, their eyes lost in the waves.
