From the very beginning, the Mutantes were strange and provocative. This was just the first in a series of apparently strange inventions that the band started to develop in the studio amid giggles and guffaws. Rita Lee Jones and Arnaldo Baptista met when they were Rita who comes from a line of Italians and Americans from the south that immigrated to Brazil after the Civil War was a member of the Teenage Singers, an all-female vocal group that covered The Shirelles, Peter, Paul and Mary along with several Beatles hits. Arnaldo was the bass player in the Wooden Faces, a band that started out cloning the instrumental rock of the Ventures, but which soon converted to Beatlesesque pop. They still emulated the Beatles, but the trio had started to write their own songs. Meanwhile, the public at large would only meet the Mutantes a year later. The impact was tremendous. In a matter of three weeks the three Mutantes, along with other musicians, poets and artists, were taking part in lively meetings that quickly evolved into an art movement. Together they changed Brazilian music.
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They released their acclaimed self-titled debut album in After a hiatus from the late s to the early s, the band reunited in , touring and recording new material. They were originally named Six Sided Rockers. They performed and recorded with many artists of this period, including Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil, before Veloso and Gil were arrested and subsequently exiled by the military government of Brazil in early
Brazilian Rock
From the very beginning, the Mutantes were strange and provocative. This was just the first in a series of apparently strange inventions that the band started to develop in the studio amid giggles and guffaws. Rita Lee Jones and Arnaldo Baptista met when they were Rita who comes from a line of Italians and Americans from the south that immigrated to Brazil after the Civil War was a member of the Teenage Singers, an all-female vocal group that covered Shirelles, and Peter, Paul and Mary songs along with several Beatles hits. Arnaldo was the bass player in the Wooden Faces, a band that started out cloning the instrumental rock of the Ventures, but which soon converted to Beatlesque pop. From then on Arnaldo and Rita would not be apart. They still emulated the Beatles, but the trio started to write their own songs. Meanwhile, the public at large would only meet the Mutantes a year later. The impact was tremendous. The fact that both used electric guitars—a first at an event traditionally dedicated to Brazilian popular music—shocked and irritated the leftist university crowd.
Simply put, they are an emblematic band indelibly associated with a particular place, time and pop style. Unlike their American counterparts, though, Os Mutantes, or the Mutants, are still playing, improbable as that may seem given their star-crossed personal, political and commercial history. Here at home, where in their first incarnation they were constantly harassed by a military dictatorship that found their hippie lifestyle and psychedelic lyrics threatening, their return has been celebrated.
