28-10-2023
She started her career at sixteen and in 2018 released her first studio album 'Mormaço Queima'. "At the beginning, I didn't want to be a musician. I had no interest, on the contrary, I think my first album is an anti-album, an anti-singer thing, an anti-industry thing," said the young artist.
"For the second album, I think what changes is my desire to understand music." 'Little Electric Chicken Heart', an album where we can drink in various artistic strands, such as Ana's poems, musical composition and photography, was released in 2019. The following year, 'Little Electric Chicken Heart' was nominated for a Latin Grammy in the category of Best Rock or Alternative Music Album in Portuguese.
This time, Ana Frango Elétrico brings us, as she herself defines it, a new musical "aesthetic". 'Call me they that I’m yours', a work in partnership with the international record label Mr Bongo, is made up of ten tracks that sound like jazz, bossa nova and boogie. Tim Maia, Cassiano, Marcos Valle, Prince, Kurt Mayfield, Earth, Wind and Fire, Everything but the Girl and Tyler The Creator are some of Ana Frango Elétrico's inspirations, in a "somewhat schizophrenic" combination, says the artist.
It's a disc, in its structure, focused on musicality, sound engineering and perfecting the voice. However, it's also about confusion. "As much as the phrase 'call me they that I'm yours' is a bit exclamatory, it's about a question mark. I don't want to get anywhere. This record is about experience, about process," Fainguelernt explained, since, while the tracks were produced with detail and research, the disc continues to have an opposite purpose to the structure.
Queer Aesthetic
"In Brazil they still don't understand the concepts of queer and non-binary, so I started to delimit myself a lot with my identity, because it has to do with me, so that people would understand. But it's not just about that. It's a queer album that connects love and identity," she said. This definition is clear when we hear phrases like: 'Your smell reminds me of my feminine side / / But today I'm a boy', in which we find the confusion and complexity of a queer love, in which sometimes the identity of one body clashes with the love of another. Throughout the album's ten tracks, we realise that the record speaks of a sexual, daring and romantic love, as Ana Frango Elétrico seeks to normalise, with an even personal and intimate touch.
In the artist's words, the album, as well as a personal reflection, was an opportunity to speak freely about the queer world: "I think talking about the queer perspective is important in an industry that doesn't have an aesthetic depth about these people. In an era where I can control my aesthetic work, I can control what I want. This disc can be a contribution, perhaps through my vision, to the music industry," he revealed.
Now the cat is out of its cage
'Call me they that I'm yours' was the most labour-intensive and emotionally draining full-length project that Ana Frango Elétrico has developed: "There was a point in the album when I couldn't work on it anymore, because it became unfeasible, because I'd already given it everything, because it was so personal... when it went wrong in personal matters, I couldn't listen to it. I don't think I'd ever get involved like that again," she concluded.
This is an album that can be listened to "any way you want: at home, in the street, working out, dancing". However, as a suggestion, Ana Frango Elétrico guaranteed that she would like it to be listened to with company... As will happen in Coimbra, at the Salão Brazil JACC, on 1 November, and in Lisbon, at the Jameson Urban Routes Festival, MusicBox, on 2 November.
[Ana Frango Elétrico is a Brazilian musical artist, and the concentrate of the quotes has been transcribed and kept with the terms and, in certain cases, the spelling of Brazilian Portuguese].
Original article: https://altamont.pt/ana-frango-eletrico-em-entrevista-por-mais-que-a-frase-me-chama-de-gata-que-eu-sou-sua-seja-exclamativa-e-sobre-uma-interrogacao/