Castella Branca...

Castella Branca was a trip. After a week spent holed up in an exclusive hotel in the Pelourinho, it was a wakeup call of sorts to get into a cab and drive out of Salvador, and find a veritable sea of favelas in all directions. Stacks of slums, piled up like crooked building blocks laid out haphazardly on woefully planned stretches of public land, the favelas are a symptom of some of the serious social problems facing Brazil. The wealth disparity in this country is as aggravated as anything I’ve seen in India and Bangladesh, and there is no physical division between classes: the very rich live alongside the very poor. Anyhow, we drove for about a half hour out to Castella Branca, where we were met by Floyd’s friends. They were documenting the creation of a fantastic community graffiti wall, about 40 meters long, which showcased some of the best graffiti artists in the area. The styles were unique, an interesting amalgamation of influences that included some African/South American art elements that I’ve never seen in any tags in the USA. It was a spectacle to behold, and it’s a wonderful thing to see the hip hop aesthetic manifesting in places where you weren’t sure it reached. But the wall, although glorious, was just one highlight on what turned out to be a very fulfilling trip…

At the end of the street, in a small public park, a few more of Floyd’s friends were camped out. There was a DJ table set up, connected to a series of speakers piled into a makeshift column, and littered around the table were crates full of records and 7” dub plates. After making a few introductions, the guys started to spin some records, in a very laid back, easy going way, and we were treated to what I can only call an original sound system dub set, courtesy of “The best ragamuffin & Dub DJs” in Bahia… I’m a student of Dub, or the aesthetic that emerged from Jamaica out of the work of artists like Lee Perry, King Tubby, Augustus Pablo, and more, who completely revamped records by finding new and interesting ways to play them on mobile sound systems throughout Jamaica. The setup these folks were rocking in Castella Branca was an echo of that world…







Mad deconstruction session
a dread convention
Spinbacks & delay filling the square
Rivulets of drippy bass spilling out into late afternoon air
Reggae by the bay
roots & raw bumping riddims winding through throbbing speaker cones
the ghost methodologies of imported island bones
synchronicity & sudden clarity in a strange place:
dub is simply stripped down sounds tweaked out & defaced
a spirit of seeking truth through minimal tools
the recrafting of the old by the hands of the new school…

…Took a public bus home. Long ride. Ended up heading out to a late dinner of Brazilian Barbeque, which was a bit overpriced but absolutely delicious and well worth it. A fabulous feast that covered the gamut from mussels to filets to chicken hearts to fried bananas… mmmm… unfortunately, when we walked out of there, I was down to my last 30 reals, no counting the cash I needed for the taxi to the airport, so I had to bail and head back to the hotel. We stood outside the Fashion Club for a minute though, a club with a formidable line out the door, of people dressed very well and looking very sharp. Gorgeous women in impossible heels and smoldering dresses, man candy fellas with afros and green eyes, triceps bulging out of designer short sleeves, everyone looked delicious… Unfortunately, I was the broke ass wallflower, so I stared for a bit and then headed back to the hotel… Last night in Brazil, I ended up staring out my balcony at the ocean, pondering the luck, fate, or fortune that brough me here to Bahia de todos os Santos…