by Raquel Pinheiro
Água-Má [another name for alforreca (jellyfish)] is Filho da
Mãe’s fourth album. Like its predecessors, Palácio (Palace), Cabeça (Head) and
Mergulho (Dive) it was recording in different locations. In this case between a
recording studio, HAUS, in Lisboa, and Madeira, where Rui Carvalho spend a week
during an artist-in-residence program working on his alter-ego’s record.
As it is usual with Filho da Mãe, in Água-Má the guitar is a
canvas, or a camera, for the images and paintings that are seen when listening
to its themes. The literal translation of Água-Má is Mean Water. Couple it with
a jellyfish and Madeira Islands, in the middle of the Atlantic, and it is not surprising
water, and watery images of every sort, from gentle flow of streams to tumultuous
waves crashing against shore, to the continuous simmering splash of a waterfall
our mind and eyes.
Filho da Mãe weaves a thread of different intensities, running
from the beach (Praia, the opening track), to home (Casa, the closing track), in
a crescendo that, after endless adventures, ebbs with the arrival to safety.
There are no voice or words or a character in Água-Má, but it wouldn’t be far-fetched
to used it as a soundtrack to Ulysses’ Odyssey.
(Lovers & Lollypops, 2018)
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