Ratos de Porão

Ratos de Porão rank among Brazil’s most influential punk rock acts, as the São Paulo scene’s key agitators who helped spark the wider Brazilian rock explosion of the 1980s. European audiences embraced the band early, prompting them to lay down the albums Brasil and Anarkophobia in Berlin. The musicians first assembled in 1981 as regulars at the Punk Rock Discos shop in São Paulo. Their initial large-scale show came the following year at the First Punk Festival of São Paulo, also known as O Começo do Fim Do Mundo. That same year they contributed a track to the compilation Sub. Once vocalist João Gordo entered the lineup in 1984, the group steadily shifted from strict punk roots into hardcore and, with the 1987 release Vivendo Cada Dia Mais Sujo e Agressivo, toward a heavy-metal crossover sound. Also in 1984 they issued their debut full-length album, Crucificados Pelo Sistema. A 1985 split live record with Cólera followed, and they were included on the British anthology World Class Punk. Boasting one of the largest catalogs among Brazilian punk outfits, the band received an all-covers tribute in 1998 when Verminose, Anões de Jardim, Gangrena Gasosa, and Poindexter recorded their material for the CD Traidô.