QUARTO SENSORIAL — A + B (review)

Album · 2012 · Jazz Related Rock

5/5 · 2013-04-22
progshine

Quarto Sensorial is a Brazilian trio that plays instrumental music. The range of their sound goes from Jazz Rock to Brazilian Music through African Music and Progressive Rock.

I’ve been following the band since 2009 when they released their virtual EP. I received that EP and I didn’t know that only 5 tracks could make me like the band so much! By the way, the EP can be free downloaded on their website (http://quartosensorial.blogspot.com/2011/03/quarto-sensorial-ep-2009.html). Being an instrumental band isn’t easy, and being from Brazil doesn’t make things easier. So the full album was released only 3 years later, but the waiting was worthy.

A + B (2012) was released in last November and as the first EP was released as a free download album (http://quartosensorial.blogspot.com/2012/11/quarto-sensorial-b-2012.html). The album was produced by Fernando Efron and Carlos Ferreira and it took around one year to be recorded. It has 7 tracks and this time the band took their music to a higher level! A + B (2012) isn’t just the trio Carlos Ferreira (guitars), Bruno Vargas (bass) and Martin Estevez (drums and percussion). As I said, the band took their sound to a new level inviting new musicians like Luciano Zanatta (saxophones) in the unbelievable track ‘Inferno Astral’ and Pablo Schinke (cello) in the two parts song ‘Voo Livre’.

A + B (2012) was born great, was born from the experience of three great musicians that have an open minds to music and to humour. I have to admit that the first time I’ve listened to A + B (2012) I wasn’t that impressed. The EP was still in my mind maybe. But I knew something was wrong, so I tried again and again… and that makes all the difference. Every time I hear the album now, new details come to my ears and I like it even more.

The frantic opening duo ‘Biotônico Ferreira’ and ‘Inferno Astral’ is something to pay attention to. When your ears start to get used to the fast pace of the beginning they shift everything with the two parts of ‘Voo Livre’. That’s something new to the Quarto Sensorial sound, the most Prog track on the album and the presence of the cello by Pablo Schinke gives the track the atmosphere it needed.

In one more radical shift we have ’08:59 AM’ just with acoustic guitars. The follow up ‘La Gambiarra’ has a Jazz feeling and as the name suggests a Latin feeling too. To close the album we have ‘Samba Cafeínado’ and of course that being from Brazil and playing instrumental Samba Quarto Sensorial is almost paying homage to Banda Black Rio. If there was a band that could mix Samba and Jazz, it was Banda Black Rio, but we finally have another king to this crown: Quarto Sensorial.

The album is quite short and has around 32 minutes. But my idea of a perfect album isn’t taking the whole 80 minutes that a normal CD can hold. No, it isn’t. The perfect album is the one that takes everything the band’s musicians got and makes every second worth. In the Quarto Sensorial s case killing bass lines, guitars that don’t want to spit out Blues clichés and a drummer that fills every blank space with intelligence. Wrap everything with music, not a simple show off and you have Quarto Sensorial, one of the finest bands that came from Brazilian lands.