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Hello, fellows! This is CEARÁ CULTURAL ROCK.
FERNANDO: On today's show, the band LOWELL.
FERNANDO: We're just getting started now with the band LOWELL
and the show they've played on Rock Cordel Festival 2013.
These first three songs are "New York", "Sweet Dreams" and "Alone.
ONNI: So, there's been a long time since I've worked on my compositions.
Then, by the middle of 2012, I had the hunch of coming through that again.
I had no band, was kind of moneyless, but the feeling came to make it.
I've spoken to a great friend of mine, Alexandre Marko, that helped me...
...and, back then, I was playing in one of Perdigão's projects - where I met Sérgio.
So the guys helped me recording some songs.
Throught some first singles recorded (in a very quick way, indeed)...
...we realized that we could make it happen.
And the boys here embraced the idea of continuing that.
Actually, I met Perdigão on the road - literally.
So, I'll let him tell us a little about that!
PERDIGÃO: Yeah, that's it. Actually, I first met Onni on 2004...
...heading to the city of Brasília, in order to play with my project "Brazilian Drumming".
Then, coincidentally, Onni was inside the same bus. We started talking...
...and I realized his rock n' roll spirit. We changed numbers, contacts...
...and, as I'm always dealing with rock and blues, that's how we met.
But we spent a lot of time without really playing together,
...because I was busy with a bunch of projects and other things.
Until a certain moment - already on the 21st century - Onni called me...
...and I brought him to one of my musical projects.
And that's where LOWELL started coming to surface...
but as a project of his own, focused on his authoral songs
and references from his idols like THE CURE, THE SMITHS...
And, this is it, we're LOWELL now, and it's been pretty good so far.
ONNI: And what about you, Sérgio? Tell us how did you jumped in.
SÉRGIO: I came to fullfil this power trio through Perdigão.
We've done some projects togheter like "Rock Brasil", "Musical Poetry", "Tropical Force"...
So I met Onni in these projects where he told us about his ideas,
"Hey, let's make these songs of mine". He started bringing the songs,
...we practiced them on the rehearsals, I started applying some guitar ideas,
...and I got that like a kind of challenge to me, because I've never written music before.
The most likely thing I've done was arranging some of Perdigão's songs.
So we started practicing, getting inside the songs, Onni brought
excellent songs, we liked a lot, and it was a challenge for us to bring
those songs he's been writing for so long to the shape they're today.
And it's been pretty interesting to me working with LOWELL so far
We've played some excellent gigs on Rock Cordel...
...and that's it. Let's head to some new roads.
ONNI: When I was around 18, somebody gave me a gift:
it was the book "On The Road", from Jack Kerouac, the writer that was
...the "beatniks" generation's frontman. And then I started to study and appreciate
his writings. I feel like his lifestyle and mine are very similar:
this kind of "adventurer", "easyrider" way of life.
And Lowell is just the name of his hometown (in Massachussets).
So the band name came as a tribute to Kerouac's work.
ONNI: I'm the author of both music and lyrics, but when I bring
them to the band, I let the guys work at will.
Perdigão and Sérgio can bring their ideas, their own style inside
the basic song structures I show them. And that's pretty cool, 'cause it turns
into a group music. Even because I never thought on something like "Onni's band".
No, I like things on this way, this shape of music,
this collective energy, works a lot better.
PERDIGÃO: I think it's cool the fact that Onni's songs are, indeed,
very personal, obviously. And my drumming is inside this
rhythm conception he brings us. So, it's not a rock n' roll I'm used to play
with other artists, 'cause it has this rock "viscerality", close to the English Rock.
SÉRGIO: And the groove is pretty awesome.
ONNI: Yeah, the interesting part is this: we have three different "schools" among us.
So lets see: name two bands you guys like.
PERDIGÃO: Uh... to me, LED ZEPPELIN and DEEP PURPLE.
SÉRGIO: WHITESNAKE and TOTO.
ONNI: JOY DIVISION and R.E.M.
(laughts)
ONNI: So this is the interesting part: when the band joined, each one brought
ideas that I might not have think about. Then, it added into a cool way.
After the songs got into the shape they are today, I saw and think:
"I never thought we would come this far". And it did just fine.
PERDIGÃO: To me, it's a challenge to play with Onni, 'cause it's another groove,
another way of playing. There are moments where I remove some notes...
you know, I put something lighter... On other moments, I do the opposite,
adding something heavier - that's the case of the song "There",
which is pretty heavy. But in another song like "Thank You",
we have drums with a little less notes, but adding an interesting groovy thing.
SÉRGIO: I even think that, i this song, we get a little like LED ZEPPELIN.
Perdigão kinda summons John Bonham, his godfather, as to say!
ONNI: I feel confortable that LOWELL will not make one and only music genre.
We'll have room in the songs for acoustic guitar, keyboards, and heavier things too.
This year, we're planning on recording the first album and we want it to be wide.
Obviously, with rock n' roll in most of it. But that doesn't hold us
from mixing other styles, other combinations. That's my main goal.
ONNI: About the composing process, it often starts in a "lonely way":
I get the guitar at home...
PERDIGÃO: It's like "Only Onni"!
(laughts)
ONNI: So, pratically, it comes the melody first, then lyrics...
and, sometimes, the opposite way. After I build the main body of the song,
I arrive at the rehearsal and show the guys the basic song.
Then, Perdigão put his beats, rhythms, trying to set some paces...
Sérgio also put his ideas with the guitar, adding layers, tones...
So, it starts with the acoustic guitar and we end up exploring the songs on studio.
It's funny to see, at the end, that are some songs we started writing
in some way, and, today, we do them another way.
Throught the rehearsals, playing, we ended testing, trying, to see how they'd work.
Now, to the record we're planning this year, we'll have songs with acoustic guitar, keyboards...
and there's a particular song in which I want to bring an accordeon,
...that might fit thinking on a kind of irish ambience for the song.
So, that's interesting: each one of us has to develop his own way of fitting
on guitar, bass and the drums to cover some lack of another musician.
On studio, we'll add these instruments but, whenever on a live concert,
we are surely thinking of hiring a guest musician - since we don't think
initially of a fourth member, but we want to get someone to participate live
with these new instruments that may appear.
We talked about Rock Cordel and Banco do Nordeste's Cultural Centre...
for one special reason: we are very grateful to them because
LOWELL's first concert was exactly on a Rock Cordel edition.
To me, it was a great achievement because, before playing, I've been
just an expectator willing to play on stage someday, always thinking
when would it be my turn to play there!
And when I was there, actually on stage, I thought that's very good having
a space like this, an idea like this to support two things that aren't easy:
rock n' roll - which is still labeled in some negative ways -
and the authoral music too, that's more important in my opinion.
'Cause bringing someone famous is "easier", but to invest on
new artists, to believe them and even support them with your money,
to artists that are starting now, is really no easy.
PERDIGÃO: I think Rock Cordel Festival is a very important tool here in Fortaleza.
It's a festival in which I've played through every edition, also working
as a producer sometimes, and, to me, it's a primordial event that boosts
the cultural production of music here in Ceará. And I feel very comfortable telling it
'cause I really love this festival, it's people, it's developers, managers
and I hope it never ends, that it may go on every year,
because of it's importance. A TV show like this, for instance,
is coming to surface in part because of Rock Cordel's demand
and Fernando Pessoa's knowledge, experience with rock music in our city,
and also with his experience working for so long in Banco do Nordeste's Cultural Centre
results in a scenario of new works, new artistic possibilities, such as
audiovisual productions an so on. And the Cultural Centre has such
a huge importance today that we have even academic researchs about it.
Sérgio here, for example, hired me to review his academical monograph
that talks exactly about the story of the Centre.
Isn't it, Sérgio?
SÉRGIO: Yeah, I'd also like to say thanks to Fernando again
'cause he was the person who helped me to get to the Centre
and develop my research, so I could study the story of the Centre
and how it came to life in a political moment
that was not very friendly to cultural policies on Ceará.
So I came across all over it's history, around the people
that helped on it's creation, within Ceará's political scenario back then.
And now we're even being through a very delicate moment: the transition
of the new elected City Mayor, a new administration coming...
And we also have the Centre itself looking for a new adress,
so as the Dragão do Mar Cultural Centre's trying to reform it's surroundings.
I even heard that Banco do Nordeste's Cultural Centre might end up
moving near to Dragão do Mar's Cultural Centre, but it's not official.
So, I think the importance of Rock Cordel to continue is that
it helps keeping our state's culture, which we know it's so rich and wide,
not restricted only to popular music (like "forró") or the comedy shows...
Ceará has a huge cultural production on Literature, on Plastic Arts, Theatre...
with a lot of good artists.
FERNANDO: That's it, guys. Our show is coming to the end
Let's stay with the last song from this super trio:
Onni Matos, Carlinhos Perdigão and Sérgio Costa:
the band LOWELL with the song "There".
Thanks a lot, see you next time!
SÉRGIO: Whoever wants to know more about us, we have a fanpage
facebook.com/bandalowell. And we have our own profiles too:
you can look for Sérgio Costa, Onni Matos and Carlinhos Perdigão
and feel free to add us. On the page, we have updated news,
some videos from the concerts, such as Rock Cordel's last gig videos...
We have three recorded songs too on Soundcloud that you can listen
all available there.